SHimjjflt^^t^^i^i^ta^ 



FRATERNAL 
AND OTHER 
ADDRESSES 



By 
MORRIS SHEPPARD 

l| 
SOVEREIGN BANKER, 
WOODMEN OF THE WORLD 

UNITED STATES SENATOR FROM TEXAS 



(SECOND EDITION) 



The Beacon Press 
Omaha, Nebraska, 1914 



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FIRST EDITION COPYRIGHT 1910 
BY MORRIS SHEPPARD 



SECOND EDITION COPYRIGHT 1914 
BY MORRIS SHEPPARD 



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DI.A391676 

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DEDICATION OF FIRST EDITION 

TO JOSEPH CULLEN ROOT, AUTHOR 
OF ALL WOODCRAFT, A PRINCE OF 
PEACE, A KING OF LOVE, AN EMPE- 
ROR OF HUMANITY, THE IDOL AND 
THE PILLAR OF MORE THAN A MIL- 
LION AMERICAN HOMES, THIS VOLUME 
IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED. 

Texarkana, Texas, April 1, 1910. 

DEDICATION OF SECOND EDITION 

TO WILLIAM ALEXANDER FRASER, 
WOODCRAFT'S GREATEST EXPONENT, 
THE KNIGHTLIEST FIGURE AMONG 
THE HOSTS OF BROTHERHOOD, MAKER 
AND BREAKER OF THE WORLD'S FRA- 
TERNAL RECORDS, WORTHY SUCCES- 
SOR OF JOSEPH CULLEN ROOT, THE 
SECOND EDITION OF THIS VOLUME 
IS DEVOTEDLY INSCRIBED. 

Washington, D. C, July 1, 1914. 






INDEX TO TITLES. 

Page 

Abraham Lincoln 232 

Address at Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 14 

Address! Presenting Jewel to Sovereign Commander Root, 

Sovereign Camp, Milwaukee, May, 1903 196 

Sovereign Commander Root's Reply. 198 

A Tribute to Books 279 

A Tribute to Falkenburg 201 

A Tribute to Old Age 265 

A Tribute to Texas J 280 

A Tribute to Virginia * 206 

Christian Citizenship 291 

Contributions of the Hebrew People to Human Advance- 
ment 209 

Eulogy of Washington 311 

Fraternity and Woodcraft 133 

"In God We Trust" 254 

Prefatory Note 7 

Response to Address of Welcome, Sovereign Camp, 

Columbus, Ohio, May, 1901 191 

Response to Toast, "The State of Ohio," Woodmen of 

the World Banquet, Columbus, Ohio, May, 1901 193 

Satire on Congressional Garden Seed 244 

The American Mother 247 

The Gospel of Woodcraft 52 

The Marquis of Montrose 274 

The Progress of Fraternalism 175 

The State of Tennessee 203 

The Tree Has Fallen 11 

The Woodmen of the World 91 

Unveiling Oration at the Grave of Ariail 42 

Unveiling Oration at the Graves of Sovereigns Cranford, 

Putnam, Robertson and others 76 

Unveiling Oration at the Graves of Sovereigns Nason, 

Baugh, Little, Robison, Gentry and Burger 118 

Unveiling Oration at the Graves of Sovereigns J. W. 

Jones and Wilson Jones 147 

Woodcraft and the Fraternal Insurance System 158 



PREFATORY NOTE. 

IT SHOULD be kept in mind that wherever figures 
are given in this volume as to the growth and size 
of the Woodmen of the World, they refer to the 
time at which the address containing them was 
delivered. 

In order that information of this nature may be 
brought to date, it is well to say that on August 1, 
1914, our membership was as follows: 

Sovereign Jurisdiction 741,000 

Woodmen Circle 149,015 

Pacific Jurisdiction 115,100 

Women of Woodcraft 48,615 

Canadian Jurisdiction 18,710 

Total 1,071,440 

Insurance in force August 1, 1914, all 

jurisdictions $1,373,529,200.00 

Sovereign Jurisdiction 964,770,600.00 

Emergency Fund August 1, 1914, all 

jurisdictions 33,325,347.41 

Sovereign Jurisdiction 23,543,909.43 

Number of monuments erected, all 

jurisdictions 60,625 



FRATERNAL AND 
OTHER ADDRESSES 



THE TREE HAS FALLEN. 

ADDRESS AT TOMB OF JOSEPH CULLEN ROOT, 
DECEMBER 29, 1913. 

WE ARE surrendering to the tomb the mortal 
remnant of one of the most notable figures 
of this or any other generation. The great- 
ness of Joseph Cullen Root will become more and 
more apparent as the wings of time sweep on. It is 
hardly possible for his contemporaries to grasp the 
magnitude of his work, the significance of his life. 
It is as if we stood at the base of some great mountain 
and attempted to measure its dimensions, to compare 
it with adjoining peaks and ranges. When the advanc- 
ing years shall have removed us far enough from the 
present period to gain a true perspective of the deeds of 
Joseph Cullen Root, to compare them with the deeds 
of others, his name will leap to the forefront of the 
earth's anointed. And his will be as pure a glory as 
shall ever be accorded to the sons of men. 

If men are to be judged by the good they do the 
fame of Joseph Cullen Root is secure. It may be said 
without exaggeration that he has done more to promote 
the cause of practical brotherhood than probably any 
other man of his time. And brotherhood is the ultimate 
ideal of the human race. It matters not what advance- 
ment the earth may make, humanity will never have 
a higher goal than love of man for fellow-man. Joseph 
Cullen Root founded two organizations devoted to 
the promotion of fraternity that acquired a combined 
membership of more than 2,000,000 before God raised 
him to the life above. He lived to see a distribution by 
these organizations of nearly 200 millions of dollars to 
the beneficiaries of deceased members. When we 

11 



The Tree Has Fallen 



think of the homes that have been thus preserved, the 
families that have been thus protected, the widows 
and orphans that have been thus shielded we may 
acquire some idea of the scope and splendor of his 
career. In the truest sense he was a benefactor of 
mankind ; in the truest sense he was food to the hungry 
and feet to the lame. The lesson of his life is that 
it is better to serve than to rule. 

The author of "Home, Sweet Home" deserved 
immortality and obtained it. And if the man who sang 
of home obtained such recognition from posterity what 
should be said of the man who provided homes for 
multiplied thousands of the human race? Potent as 
are all the melodies that describe the home, more 
potent far is the song of the dollars that drop from a 
Woodman certificate into the lap of widowhood, the 
song that drives the mortgage from the roof, the wolf 
from the door. The home is the foundation of all 
progress. Without it civilization would be a farce 
and anarchy inevitable. In having done so much to 
preserve the home Joseph Cullen Root has performed a 
labor that will be trumpeted from everlasting unto 
everlasting. 

While fashioning a ritual and other features for the 
Woodmen of the World, the great order over whose 
destinies he presided with such success for nearly a 
quarter of a century, he conceived the idea of erecting a 
monument at the graves of all departed Woodmen. 
He thus produced what may well be called one of the 
most effective human symbols of fraternity. Today 
more than 45,000 monuments rise above the graves of 
Woodmen throughout the United States. The Wood- 
men monument is today recognized not only as a dis- 
tinctive characteristic of Woodcraft, not only as an 
evidence of the originality and the genius of Joseph 



12 



The Tree Has Fallen 



Cullen Root, but also as a tribute to the man who 
sleeps beneath it. It teaches the fundamental truth 
that above social, political and financial attainments 
are to be placed the permanent attributes of the human 
heart. It bears to every man the knowledge that by 
taking the necessary steps to protect his family and to 
save his home he may attain a distinction higher in 
the esteem of heaven than that of the most pampered 
child of wealth and fame. In sending this message 
through the Woodmen monument to mankind Joseph 
Cullen Root has not only given an enormous impetus 
to the idea of brotherhood, to the doctrine of equality, 
but has also erected for himself within the hearts of 
men a monument that will endure when the pyramids 
are dust. 

He had an unexcelled capacity for organization. 
This is evidenced by the growth of the Woodmen of 
the World under his supervision. In addition to his 
executive capacities he had a lovable personality. His 
relations with all mankind, from the humblest to the 
highest, were marked by geniality and kindness. We 
who were privileged to associate with him both per- 
sonally and officially know how powerless are any 
human terms to express our affection and appreciation, 
our sympathy for the surviving members of his family. 

We may pay him no higher tribute than to say that 
by reason of his presence in the world there are more 
homes and happier homes. There are fewer tears and 
fewer sighs. There is less poverty and less despair. 
The prayers of the widowed and the fatherless accom- 
pany him to judgment. The love of millions goes 
with him to the gates of God. The memory of his 
services to humanity will flourish in the souls of men 
till deep shall call to deep no more. 



13 



ADDRESS AT DEDICATION OF NEW 

WOODMEN OF THE WORLD 

BUILDING. 

OMAHA, NEB., OCTOBER 3, 1912. 

THE completion of the structure we dedicate today 
stamps upon public attention the Woodmen of 
the World, the objects for which it stands, the 
movement of which it is so conspicuous a part. We 
are dedicating today the largest fraternal insurance 
headquarters building on the globe. This fact must 
stir the soul of every member of the organization that 
has constructed this palace of fraternity, and of every 
citizen of Omaha, the city whose growth and enterprise 
make it a fitting location for so notable an edifice. 

The language of eulogy would be pauperized to 
provide an adequate description of the Woodmen of 
the World. The achievements of this order are the 
most eloquent evidences of its glory. Woodcraft needs 
not the tongue of oratory to proclaim its excellence. It 
finds sufficient tribute in this temple of brotherhood, 
at once a marvel of utility and a dream of art. It finds 
sufficient tribute in more than eleven hundred millions 
of insurance in force in all branches and jurisdictions 
with which it shelters more than nine hundred thousand 
American homes. It finds sufficient tribute in the 
army of nine hundred thousand members now gathered 
beneath its standards, a number growing so rapidly 
that soon a million Sovereigns will answer the working 
sign and salute the flag of Woodcraft. It finds suffi- 
cient tribute in the 75 millions of dollars it has paid 
the beneficiaries of its dead. It finds sufficient tribute 
in the 45,000 monuments it has erected above the 
ashes of its departed. It finds sufficient tribute in an 

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At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

emergency fund of over 22 millions of dollars, a fund 
destined to become a veritable rock of ages as each 
year's accumulations anchor it more firmly in the 
foundations of financial strength, a fund invested in 
bonds of the highest character. It finds sufficient 
tribute in the thousands of dollars with which it has 
relieved the destitution and the disabilities of age, in 
the care it has bestowed upon the sick, in the sympathy 
and love with which it has ministered to the unfor- 
tunate and the distressed. It finds sufficient tribute 
in the hearts of mothers, the prayers of orphans, the 
laughter of children reclaimed from hunger and de- 
spair. And I tell you that I would rather wipe one 
tear from the cheek of a child than to hold the highest 
offices within the gift of the American people. 

The building we dedicate constitutes the head- 
quarters of the Sovereign Jurisdiction by which it 
has been erected. The Sovereign Jurisdiction is the 
largest branch of Woodcraft, with a membership of 
630,000, an emergency fund of nearly 15 millions, a 
benefit distribution since the beginning of over 50 mil- 
lions, with other features in proportion. It comprises 
the territory of the American Union outside the nine 
extreme western states, which are known as the Pacific 
Jurisdiction, with headquarters at Denver. The other 
divisions are the Canadian Jurisdiction, embracing all 
of Canada; the Woodmen Circle, ladies' auxiliary of 
the Sovereign Jurisdiction ; the Women of Woodcraft, 
operating within the limits of the Pacific Jurisdiction ; 
with headquarters respectively at London (Ont), 
Omaha (Neb.) and Portland (Ore.). Especial mention 
should be made on this occasion of those who stand 
at the head of our co-ordinate divisions — of Boak, who 
so ably conducts the Pacific Jurisdiction; of Mrs. 
Emma B. Manchester, a magnificent type of American 

15 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

womanhood, who guides with unerring judgment and 
amazing vision the destinies of the Woodmen Circle; 
of Mrs. Carrie C. Van Orsdall, who directs with re- 
markable efficiency the Women of Woodcraft; of 
Harrison, who presides so successfully over the 
Canadian branch. Chief credit and affection, however, 
must be accorded the man who has occupied the highest 
position in the Sovereign Jurisdiction from its birth, 
who inaugurated the entire order and conceived the 
initial idea of Woodcraft — that marvelous combination 
of heart and intellect — Joseph Cullen Root. 

Some seven years prior to 1890, the year the 
Woodmen of the World began, he had organized 
another fraternal insurance order, and he has lived to 
see these orders, children of his brain, become within a 
single generation the two largest fraternal insurance 
societies in the United States. He has seen them 
reach a combined membership in all branches and 
divisions of over two million American citizens, whose 
homes they protect with over three billion dollars of 
insurance, having already distributed to the widows 
and orphans of their dead approximately one hundred 
and ninety millions of dollars. Their ministrations to 
the sick and unfortunate can not be measured in figures 
or words. What other man in all history has done so 
much for humanity? No king, no congress, no presi- 
dent, no statesman, no philosopher can approach this 
record of practical blessings for mankind. It is a 
matter of intense regret that Sovereign Commander 
Root is prevented by the state of his health from 
being present on this occasion which symbolizes the 
fruition of his life. From millions of American homes 
and hearts speed sincerest wishes for his quick recov- 
ery, his safe return from foreign lands. His official 
associates, comprising other elective officers of the 

16 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

Sovereign Jurisdiction, are here to participate in the 
ceremonies of dedication — Fraser, the greatest frater- 
nal organizer of the time; Yates, a veritable genius 
for system and for detail ; Jewell, the sleepless guardian 
of expenditures; Fitz Gerald, capable supervisor of 
every financial transaction, aided by his fellow-man- 
agers, Maxey, Lewis, Patterson, Campbell, Wells and 
Ruess; the Sovereign Officers, Simrall and Bradshaw, 
both able and devoted; the Sovereign Physicians, 
Cloyd and Porter, both with enviable records of profes- 
sional skill and personal integrity; our gifted General 
Attorney, A. H. Burnett. 

Let no man question the sacredness of our cause. 
More people are murdered by poverty, by disease, by 
lack of decent opportunities and surroundings than by 
all the wars of history. When the better instincts of 
our nature are destroyed by woe and want and bitter 
toil, when famine banishes faith and hunger hope, when 
the struggle for existence expels the luster from the 
eye, the color from the lip, ambition from the soul we 
die ; we die, although we may move through the weary 
years with every function of the physical being still 
intact. The man or woman, boy or girl, whom lack of 
food and shelter drives to crime, to shame, are living 
corpses doomed to wander about the earth mere ghosts 
and shadows of their real selves. What hour is most 
prolific of such results? It is the hour of the dissolu- 
tion of the home when women and children are de- 
prived of the provider's sustaining arm. It is the 
purpose of Woodcraft to neutralize such disasters. 

It is the duty of the members of this order so to 
shape its laws and policies that it may pursue its great 
mission undisturbed. We are not concerned with 
problems of state or with issues that divide the polit- 
ical parties of the time. The tariff, the currency, the 

17 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

foreign trade, the regulation of corporate enterprise, 
the disposition of subject territory, the extent of the 
military establishment and similar questions have 
little place in our deliberations. We handle a ques- 
tion deeper than these, a question comprising the 
basis and the fountain of all government. It has been 
my fortune to witness in the Capitol at Washington 
the political battles of the current age. I have seen 
the clash of parliamentary legions, the fierce conten- 
tions for various policies of government, various 
theories of legislation. From their places in the Sen- 
ate and the House I have heard statesmen thunder 
arguments and anathemas. I have seen the skirmish 
and the charge of legislative squadrons. I have heard 
the artillery of invective, the musketry of debate. I 
have heard the angry captains and the shouting hosts. 
And when the controversy was at its height I have 
turned in fancy from the turbulent scene to contemplate 
the vision of an humble American home, and like a 
light from morning's altars the truth broke over me 
that without this quiet cottage there would be no tariff 
to adjust, no currency to regulate, no navies to enlarge, 
no republic to preserve. It is in the interest of the 
home that Woodcraft exists. 

The home is the unit of all society, the foundation 
of all government, the comfort and the crown of life! 
It preceded every form of government, every race and 
type of man. When the first mother gave the first 
life from her own the first home began. When her 
first kiss pressed the little lips of the new born being 
fresh from God the home became the echo and the 
mirror of a celestial realm. From that far hour until 
this the spot most sacred in any age or zone has been 
the home. Let those who will acclaim the pomp of 
war, the trumpet's cry, the cannon's call, the lightning 

18 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

of uplifted swords, the mutilated living, the ghastly 
dead. Let those who will acclaim the glory bought 
with human blood, the valor signalized by the crushing 
of uncounted lives. As for me, I place above all this 
the courage and the sacrifice of motherhood which 
does not take, but gives, a life. Long before the 
birth of history the family and the home became the 
precursors of all progress, all safety, all peace, all 
hope. To the family and the home may be traced 
what is most fundamental in our civilization. The 
desire to provide a place where the family might per- 
manently reside, to shelter it from flood and storm, 
from sun and snow, gave rise to the individual owner- 
ship of land, the basic principle of private property. 
From that primal idea gradually developed the modern 
system of land titles, the laws of inheritance, descent 
and distribution. And the institution of marriage, the 
basis of the home, has been from the earliest eras 
united with the idea of individual ownership of land. 
The desire to maintain the family in a state of peace, to 
preserve the fireside from strife and massacre turned 
savage tribes from war. Thus were laid the founda- 
tions of agriculture, barter and exchange on which 
were slowly builded the complex structure of modern 
industry. The necessity of co-operation for the main- 
tenance of peace, the common ties of home and family 
which united men regardless of locality, produced the 
sentiment of brotherhood, a sentiment that became the 
chief factor in eliminating hate and force and fear 
from human deeds and creeds. Thus the principle of 
fraternity found its origin in the democracy of the 
fireside; thus motherhood created brotherhood. It 
may not be going too far to say that the common 
interest of the home will yet combine the world in 
love and peace. It is the touch of nature that makes 

19 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

sang "Home, Sweet Home" in the federal prison at 
Atlanta. 

The institutions that make it possible for every 
citizen to preserve his home are the fraternal insurance 
orders. They did not begin in the United States until 
about the time of the American civil war. It was 
indeed a happy ordinance of God that on the eve of the 
most frightful conflict the world ever knew, when the 
red reflection of the strife was about to mantle the 
pitying heavens, a movement should begin which was 
destined to make another civil war impossible. It may 
be truly said that the fraternal insurance movement 
has been one of the most powerful agencies in abolish- 
ing the spirit of sectionalism in the United States. 
Combining the people of the country from every sec- 
tion, from the North, the South, the East, the West, 
in a supreme effort to protect the American home, it 
awakened a new era of brotherhood, a new period of 
patriotism. Arms that had been raised to strike were 
extended to embrace. Lips that had uttered the sen- 
tences of hate spoke messages of fraternal love. Hearts 
that had surged in anger beat in friendly unison. The 
bivouacs that lit up the night of war were supplanted 
by the glow of peaceful firesides. The tumults of the 
battle were succeeded by the shouts of children in 
contented homes. Committing every prejudice to the 
sepulchers of the past, the American people welcomed 
the fraternal movement with an enthusiasm unexam- 
pled in all time. It offered them a basis of united and 
harmonious action, a watchword that will be shouted 
from the crests of coming centuries, a sentiment to be 
cherished with equal devotion beneath every sky and 
every star, a principle embodied beyond all rivalry in 
the Woodmen of the World, the preservation of the 
family, the salvation of the home. 

22 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

Too much can not be said in condemnation of the 
man who disregards this task, who violates this obliga- 
tion. The saddest of all human spectacles is a penni- 
less family about a desolate fireside. What pardon may 
be expected by the man who despite every warning, 
despite every opportunity, despite invitation after in- 
vitation to join some order like the Woodmen of the 
World leaves his wife and children unprotected? 

Here let it be said that it is impossible to measure 
earth's indebtedness to woman, to woman, the empress 
of the fireside, the maker of the home. In her presence 
men must bow as before earth's queenliest ornament. 
In her presence we must stand as those "whom some 
strange dream enthralls, far, far away in some lost life 
divine." Who can describe or understand her loyalty 
to him whom love has made the monarch of her soul? 
Who can describe or understand the quiet valor with 
which she marches to the silent battlefields that loom 
before her? Who can describe or understand the 
tenderness, the devotion and the toil with which she 
weaves the weary chaplet of the nights, the days, the 
months, the years? Who can describe or understand 
the grief of those before whom rise like accusing 
fingers from the past the indifferences and the neglects 
they caused her to endure? Who can describe or 
understand the infamy of the man who would crush 
her life with cruelty or cause her needless pain? Had 
I the stature of some Hercules of the skies, with arms 
that reached from earth to sun, I would fling such a 
man into space so far that H alley's comet could not 
catch him in a million years. 

There is in all literature no more terrible picture 
of the punishment visited upon the spirits of the lost 
than Dante's Inferno, that "mediaeval miracle of song." 
Ijt is a description of the author's fancied journey 

23 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

through the nine circles of hell. Losing his way in a 
dark and forbidding forest he reaches a hill which 
seems to offer the only chance of safe egress, when he 
is confronted by ravenous beasts. Here he accosts the 
shade of Virgil sent from the pit of torment by Beatrice, 
Dante's former love, now a saint in heaven, to conduct 
him through the realms of woe whose entrance he is 
unconsciously approaching, and which now presents 
the only avenue of escape. Thus guided Dante enters 
through a gloomy gate the regions of horror. Through 
the darkness he sees the outlines of a mass of writhing, 
shrinking forms swept through the air by an eternal 
whirlwind. He is told by Virgil that these are the 
spirits of those who while on earth were neutral at all 
times and on all questions, championing nothing, op- 
posing nothing, and who, rejected by heaven and 
refused by hell, were doomed to wander on the latter's 
brink forever. Continuing their way the classic pair 
now reach the mysterious river that all the lost must 
cross before entering the abysses of torture. They 
see the moaning multitudes gather at the river's edge 
to be transported to the prisons of unending pain : 

"God and their parents they blaspheme; 
The human kind, the place, the time, the seed 
Of their engendering and of their birth. 
Then, weeping bitterly, they all repaired 
Together to the shore accurst which waits 
Each man that fears not God." 

Swooning at the sight, Dante awakes to find himself 
on the other shore and at the very mouth of the infernal 
pit whence wailings rolled and crashed like ever- 
deepening thunder. 

Still led by Virgil he descends into the first circle of 
the great gulf of hell. Here in an atmosphere of 

24 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

dazzling light he sees the shades of those who while 
on earth had been without opportunity to own the 
faith, the towering figures of the pagan ages who were 
condemned to no physical agony, but to hopeless 
longing. Before him march the spectral forms of 
Homer, Horace, Hector, Aeneas, Cornelia, Plato, Tully, 
Galen, Saladin and others with whom Virgil himself 
belongs. Thence Dante and Virgil descend into the 
second circle, an area of thickest darkness, through 
which a train of frenzied spirits are whipped by an 
everlasting hurricane, those who on earth had followed 
the paths of luxury and lust, among them Semiramis, 
Cleopatra, Paris, Helen, Tristan and Francesca. The 
third circle reveals a prostrate throng on which there 
falls a furious rain, all heavy, foul, unceasing, cold — 
torn by a monster, half animal, half man, doomed to 
suffer through the ages till the judgment notes shall 
sound, the gluttons of earth whose appetites had 
blinded continence and reason. In the fourth circle 
is portrayed the punishment of the avaricious and the 
extravagant, the misers and the prodigals, who are 
compelled to roll large weighs in opposite directions 
about this circle until they meet, and, turning, to re- 
peat the dismal round forever. 

Passing down into the fifth circle they find a lake 
of mire in which the unhappy culprits bruise and tear 
each other, those who yielded in life to violent anger, 
while at the bottom of the marsh lie those whose sullen 
tempers deprived them of the joys of heaven and whose 
attempts to speak are choked and stifled with the 
slime. Within the sixth circle they enter a phantom 
city guarded by gorgons and by furies wherein are kept 
in tombs of flame the souls of those who defied the 
faith. The seventh circle they find divided into three, 
the first containing a river of scalding blood wherein 

25 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

are murderers and all those who have committed vio- 
lence against the person or the property of others; 
the second a wood of twisted trees in which the spirits 
of suicides are imprisoned ; the third a waste of boiling 
sand where writhe beneath a rain of fire the souls of 
those who have blasphemed the name of God. Within 
the eighth circle they behold ten trenches holding re- 
spectively panderers and seducers scourged by demons ; 
flatterers immersed in filth; simoniacs who trafficked 
in holy offices implanted in a wall of rock with only 
their burning feet protruding; necromancers with 
heads reversed upon their bodies; barrators in pools 
of fiery pitch ; hypocrites staggering in cloaks of lead ; 
thieves torn by serpents; counselors of evil wrapped 
in flames; sowers of discord gashed and multilated; 
falsifiers, counterfeiters, perjurers tormented with 
fevers, dropsy, madness and all manner of disease. 
Descending into the ninth circle, which completes the 
somber journey and whence they rise into the world 
of living things again, they see the shades of traitors, 
traitors to benefactors, friends, companions; traitors 
to kindred, country and to God, locked in eternal ice, 
their tears all hail, their breath all frost. Thus ends 
the hideous expedition, and I sometimes think that 
Dante, the great Florentine, in giving this conception 
of torment to the world, ought to have constructed 
another circle with fitting punishments for the men 
who would subject their wives, the companions of 
their hopes, the comrades of their years, to cruelty 
and pain. 

Now what is the distinguishing feature of the sys- 
tem exemplified in the fraternal insurance orders? 
What is its fundamental characteristic? The especial 
mark of the system is the fact that it combines the 
abstract principle of fraternity with the mathemati- 

26 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

cal principle of insurance. The principle of fraternity 
has been for ages a glorious factor in the life of the 
world. It received its most lasting illustration in the 
teachings and the deeds of Christ. It became a living 
force when God first set the armies of the stars in 
motion. It sent an accusing thrill through the soul 
of Cain when lifting his hands in false denial he 
exclaimed, "Am I my brother's keeper?" It flowered 
as an ideal basis of society from Abraham's procla- 
mation of the one and only God, the father of all 
the children of mankind. It has prompted every 
dream of freedom, every prayer for liberty in the 
darkest epochs of the race. It has strengthened pa- 
triots and encouraged martyrs. It has lifted men into 
the light of liberty, prosperity and truth. It has in- 
cited revolutions for the common good. It has shielded 
the weak and repressed the strong. It has builded 
republics on the ruins of thrones. It has found an 
appropriate embodiment in various organizations from 
remotest times. In Masonry, Odd Fellowship and 
similar forms it has united vast numbers of men in 
ritualistic devotion around the altars of brotherhood, 
the number of Masons and Odd Fellows in the United 
States being estimated at not less than five millions. 
These organizations are flourishing throughout the 
world today in common with later societies of similar 
purpose, notably the Knights of Pythias, Elks, Forest- 
ers, Red Men, Eagles, Moose, Hibernians, Rechabites, 
Mechanics and the like, and every friend of humanity, 
every lover of fraternity wishes for them increasing 
prominence and success. 

While these institutions have made beneficent 
provision for members and the families of members 
in sickness and in distress and paid in claims for 
sickness approximately 500 millions of dollars they 

27 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

have not developed this phase into a definite system 
of insurance. They have mainly emphasized the 
abstract and social features of fraternity. It has 
remained for the fraternal insurance order to employ a 
plan whereby every member by virtue of the act of 
joining becomes insured for the benefit of dependent 
ones. The insurance order has thus added to the 
ritualistic portrayal of fraternity the most practical 
expression fraternity could possibly obtain — the per- 
manent and scientific insurance of every member's 
life. Thus the insurance order covers every phase of 
fraternal activity, the ceremonies of brotherhood, the 
care of the sick, the needy, the distressed, the payment 
of a substantial and definite sum to dependents after a 
member's death. The principle of life insurance had 
been understood and practiced for more than a century 
before the advent of the fraternal insurance order. It 
was itself of fraternal nature. Briefly stated it meant 
the co-operation of a number of individuals who by 
separate and uniform contributions established a fund 
which should stand as a shield against the results of 
death. It had been employed as a means of profit by 
commercial companies, or had been combined with the 
idea of investment, to such an extent that the rates 
became almost prohibitive to the struggling masses. 
The mission of the fraternal insurance order was to 
unite the people in a voluntary, self-governing organi- 
zation, with no idea of profit, and thus to bring the 
benefits of insurance within the reach of the humblest 
fireside and the poorest home. Perhaps I shall be able 
to give some definite idea of the difference in cost 
between the commercial and fraternal systems of insur- 
ance when I say that the net rates on whole life 
insurance in the former are more than twice as high 
as in the latter, while the rates in the former on insur- 

28 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

ance with investment features added are from three to 
seven times as high as the straight life insurance 
charges, which constitute the sole function of the latter. 
Comparing the expense charge levied by the com- 
panies and the orders, it will be seen that the former 
are far higher than the latter. 

It is evident that in the fraternal insurance system 
both fraternity and insurance reach the point of highest 
practical good for humanity. Naturally when the 
combination was first made and the system had its 
first actual trial the results were unsatisfactory. 
Naturally it was most difficult to develop at first effort 
a permanent, scientific and faultless system. It is true 
that the fraternal insurance system had been flourish- 
ing in England for more than eighty years when the 
first American insurance order was established, prac- 
tically every problem of organization and conduct 
having been solved in England before the close of the 
eighteenth century. As in so many other phases of 
our internal development we failed to utilize the expe- 
rience of older countries. Be this as it may, the 
founders of fraternal insurance in the United States 
with no guide but the impulse of brotherhood con- 
fronted every difficulty with unfaltering patience and 
determination. Today, only fifty-five years after the 
beginning of the first fraternal insurance order in the 
United States, the United States Grand Lodge of the 
Order of B'rith Abraham founded in 1859 we have a 
few more than 200 of such orders with a total mem- 
bership of over seven and a half millions, more than 
a third of the total voting population of the United 
States. Taking those dependent on active members 
into account we see that the system touches the lives 
and destinies of nearly forty millions of the American 
people. When we consider how the fraternal insurance 

29 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

movement resulted from a desire of the masses to 
secure for their dependent ones the blessings of insur- 
ance, how this movement rose from the crudest of 
beginnings to a colossal system of financial distribu- 
tion we look in vain for a prototype or parallel in 
history. There have been popular movements in 
almost every century with some beneficent purpose 
in view, but they never reached a basis of permanent 
financial return to participants or the families of par- 
ticipants. On the contrary, they resulted often in 
enormous loss of life and treasure as in the case of 
the crusades. The fraternal insurance movement is 
perhaps the first instance in history of organizations 
embracing millions of people and dedicated to the 
loftiest of sentiments evolving without the co-opera- 
tion or the sympathy of the commercial world a plan 
for the financial protection of the families of their dead, 
a plan whose ultimate fruition will be growth of mem- 
bership and increase of funds at such a rate that the 
preservation of every American home will be assured, 
the menace of poverty materially lessened. 

Among the insurance societies of the United States 
the Woodmen of the World is perhaps the most ad- 
vanced. Its emergency fund of twenty-two millions in 
all jurisdictions, its burial and unveiling ceremonies 
place it in the foremost rank of the fraternal insurance 
movement. Its funereal rites are as eloquent as they 
are significant, as impressive as they are beautiful. 
From the beginning of the race the grave has wielded 
an intense and somber fascination. The burial of each 
pale and pulseless body though typifying the universal 
fate of man throws wide the gates of grief, arouses new 
and more profound reflection. The Woodman burial 
rites embody the purest philosophy, the sweetest hope 
of all the centuries. Let us contrast them with the 

30 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

burial scene of some monarch of the past. One of the 
weirdest and most striking funerals of history was that 
of Attila, the terror of the earth, the "scourge of God." 
Establishing his sway from China to the Rhine, he had 
hurled his savage myrmidons across the civilized 
regions of the globe, a war-drunk mass that threatened 
to subvert all order, peace and law. With fear unutter- 
able he filled all lands and hearts, while emperors spoke 
his name in whispers. He gave cities to the torch and 
peoples to the sword. Palace and hovel shrank in 
common dread from the hoof beats of his countless 
cavalry. Priests, babes and mothers, the aged, the 
afflicted and the weak were mingled in a promiscuous 
destruction. Foremost in avarice, ferocity and lust, 
he called his followers almost every hour to new out- 
rage and fresher massacre. His repulse at Chalons 
amid unequaled carnage averted the doom of civiliza- 
tion. In that contest brooks became floods of blood 
surrounding islands of the slain. Only the appeals of 
Lucifer beseeching the rebel angels to assault again 
the parapets of heaven provide a parallel for the des- 
perate eloquence of Attila in urging his broken num- 
bers to renew the strife. Recovering his baleful power 
within a year he made a road of ashes through the 
fairest parts of Italy. The lordliest city of the world, 
the capital of an empire once invincible, bought peace 
from this barbarian with ransom and with prayer. 
Prompted by a resurgent appetite to sack and kill he 
was preparing another incursion more dreadful than 
all the rest when death lifted his apparition from the 
souls of states and men. It was appropriate that the 
excesses of savage revelry, the bursting of a super- 
heated vein while in a debauch should have hastened 
his demise. Then followed the weird ceremony about 
his bier, the fantastic measures of encircling squadrons, 

31 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

the cadences of a barbaric dirge. The rude mourners 
gashed their faces in order that the warrior's hero 
might be commemorated with warriors' blood, not 
women's tears. His body, his weapons, his ornaments 
and his spoils were buried in three coffins, one of gold, 
one of silver and one of iron, buried secretly in the 
night. The captives who performed the task were 
slain and carousals followed. What a comparison the 
burial of Attila presents with the burial of a Sovereign 
of the Woodmen of the World ! The funeral of a mem- 
ber of this order is a modest and sincere outpour- 
ing of neighbors, brothers, friends to deliver the last 
salutations of affection and respect. The Woodman 
funeral signalizes a life of continence and devotion. 
The officers of the Camp in plain regalia, Sovereigns, 
neighbors, friends in ordinary garb follow the corpse 
to the narrow sanctuary of the dust. About the open 
grave the Sovereigns gather in the image of the wedge, 
one of the basic symbols of the order. We hear the 
voice of the Consul Commander pronouncing the 
Woodmen requiem for the dead — 

"Life is the flower that blows, 
Death is the withered leaf; 
Life is the grain as it grows, 
Death is the garnered sheaf. 

Life is the blazing fire, 

Death is the ash grown cold; 
Life is the glittering spire, 

Death is the ruin old." 

Suddenly from a mass of flowers on the lowered casket 
a dove of stainless white is liberated and upward 
sweeps to dip its plumage in the purest skies, an 
emblem of the soul as it rises from the clay to glory. 
The monument erected by the Woodmen of the 
World at the graves of its dead is perhaps our most 

32 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

original and distinctive feature. The Woodman monu- 
ment is one of the most fitting symbols the doctrine 
of equality and brotherhood have ever known. It is 
perhaps the most signal contribution of Joseph Cullen 
Root, the founder of Woodcraft, to the symbolism and 
the progress of fraternity. There stands near Bucking- 
ham Palace in London one of the most notable monu- 
ments of modern or of ancient times — a memorial in 
honor of Queen Victoria. It is remarkable not only 
for splendor of design and massiveness of structure, 
but for the ruler and the period it commemorates. It 
was built by contributions from every portion of the 
British Empire, a tribute representing more races and 
countries than had ever before united in a similar aim. 
It was dedicated to a sovereign who had reigned for 
more than six decades of the nineteenth century, who 
had presided over greater numbers of mankind and 
witnessed greater material advancement than any 
other ruler of the past. The base of this beautiful 
structure of marble and gold is a raised foundation 
surrounded by walls on which are fountains and basins 
emblemizing the maritime feature of the English em- 
pire. Over the fountains are reclining figures repre- 
senting science, art, the army and the navy. Pedestals 
near the front and rear steps of the base bear colossal 
figures supported by lions, the figures in front repre- 
senting progress and peace, those in the rear typifying 
agriculture, labor, manufacture, both groups suggesting 
the things on which the British government must 
depend for its existence. From the center of the 
elevated foundation the monument rises to a height of 
eighty-two feet. About half way between the base and 
the summit is a gigantic figure of Victoria seated on a 
throne with orb and scepter and looking toward the 
heart of London. To her right and left are figures 

33 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

symbolic of justice and truth, while on the opposite 
side is a sculptured group denoting motherhood. On 
the cornices above these figures are eagles symbolic of 
dominion; above the eagles are the images of con- 
stancy and courage surmounted by an orb on which 
stands an angel of victory with outstretched wings, in 
one hand an olive branch, the other pointing to the 
skies. The entire memorial was designed and executed 
by Thomas Brock, who was knighted for its completion 
after ten years of labor. The scene of the unveiling 
of this monument was brilliant and impressive. The 
veil was liberated by King George V, grandson of 
Victoria, in the presence of Emperor William II of 
Germany, another grandson. On an improvised floor- 
ing in front of the monument gathered four thousand 
of the most distinguished persons in the public life of 
the British empire. Beyond this company thousands 
of people gathered. The uniforms of the guards of 
honor, the robes of bishops and archbishops, the sur- 
plices of the choir, the costumes of officers from every 
part of the empire, of ministers and ambassadors from 
many lands, formed a memorable setting for the dedi- 
cation of this tribute to human glory. Little perhaps 
did anyone there think of the statue of Rameses that 
had been found a few years before face downward 
in the dust of ages, a statue that had thousands of 
years before surmounted a mightier monument than 
this. Little perhaps did anyone in attendance think 
that at the very time of this royal ceremony there 
were assembled at various places in a republic on the 
other side of the Atlantic crowds of plain citizens who 
were also unveiling monuments to their sacred dead. 
These monuments were small in comparison with the 
Victorian pile, — plain, granite shafts, and nowhere 
could be seen the insignia of royalty or aristocracy. 

34 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

The ceremonies in progress about these monuments 
were those of a fraternal order representing the purest 
and most practical expression of human brotherhood, 
the Woodmen of the World. They consisted of a few 
simple but significant rites, the Consul Commander 
ordering the veil to be removed with these words: 
"Remove the veil and let God's sunlight shine upon 
this monument to our departed Sovereign.'' The men 
whose memories were thus honored were not sovereigns 
as was Victoria, but as were all their brethren in Wood- 
craft sovereigns of brotherhood and love. The men 
whose monuments were thus uncovered had won this 
distinction through membership in the Woodmen of the 
World, leaving their families protected, their homes 
secure. And I say to you that the humble home of 
the citizen will endure when the Victorian column 
shall have crumbled. I say to you that the modest 
monuments of these crownless kings of true fraternity 
typify a more lasting sentiment than all the memorials 
that ever rose to mark the splendor of the proud or 
the power of the strong. 

Another conspicuous feature of the Woodmen of 
the World is its devotion to the American flag. In all 
its meetings the American flag is displayed above 
the station of the presiding officer. Thus the Wood- 
men of the World pays tribute to the country of its 
nativity. One of the essential doctrines of Woodcraft 
is reverence for the flag. 

The American flag; as we contemplate it what 
visions rise! We see the standards that preceded it 
on the western hemisphere. We see Columbus in 1492 
unfurling on the island of San Salvador the royal 
standard of Spain, the first flag so far as human records 
show to appear near our Atlantic shore. We see John 
Cabot and his sons in 1497 planting the red cross of 

35 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

St. George, England's meteor flag, and the Venetian 
banner of St. Mark on the coast of what is now known 
as Labrador. A year later we see Sebastian Cabot 
raising the British colors on what is now the New 
England coast. Throughout the sixteenth century we 
see various expeditions from England to the western 
world all raising the English flag. We see Balboa in 
1513, a drawn sword in one hand, the flag of Spain in 
the other, advancing into the Pacific until the tide 
rises to his knees, lifting for the first time a European 
standard above the waters of that widest of the seas. 
We see Cortez in 1521 establishing his banner of velvet 
and gold in the land of what now is Mexico. We see 
Cartier in 1535 planting the banner of France on the 
banks of the St. Lawrence, the first European flag to 
find a mirror in its waters. We see De Soto in 1540 
unfolding the first European flag on the Mississippi. 
We see the beginnings of English civilization at 
Jamestown and Plymouth Rock in 1607 and 1620, the 
English flag now consisting of the white cross of St. 
Andrew and the red cross of St. George, a recognition 
of the union of 1606 between Scotland and England. 
We see Hendrick Hudson in 1609 raising the standard 
of the Netherlands on the island of Manhattan, a flag 
of orange, white and blue, a flag that became the official 
standard of the Manhattan colony. We see red substi- 
tuted for orange on this flag by order of the Dutch 
government in 1650, and we thus see for the first time 
on the American continent the historic combination of 
red, white and blue on a flag. We see the Swedish 
and Finnish colonists in 1638 planting the yellow cross 
of Sweden on the Delaware. 

As the sense of nationality and the desire for liberty 
develop we see each American colony adopting a 
flag of its own, each flag being a modification of the 

36 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

original English flag. When the revolution begins 
we see a variety of standards in the colonial army, 
notably the pine tree flag of Massachusetts, bearing 
the inscription, "An Appeal to Heaven," and the rattle- 
snake banner of South Carolina containing the charac- 
teristic words, "Don't tread on me." We see the 
colonial troops on Prospect Hill at Cambridge on the 
first day of January, 1776, raise the first official flag of 
the united colonies, a flag with thirteen alternate red 
and white stripes and the combined crosses of St. An- 
drew and St. George. It signifies the union of the 
colonies for defense, but not for independence, their 
determination to vindicate their rights, if possible, with- 
out separation from the mother country. With the 
declaration of independence in July of that year we 
see the disappearance of the last hope of reconciliation 
with the mother country and the substitution of thir- 
teen stars for the English crosses on the American flag. 
We see the busy fingers of Betsy Ross making the first 
banner of the stars and stripes and we note that an 
American woman fashioned the first American flag. 
We see the official adoption of the stars and stripes 
by the Continental Congress in June, 1777, and a few 
weeks later we see John Paul Jones raise the first 
American flag on an American man-of-war, the very 
flag that two years afterward fluttered defiantly at the 
mastpeak of the Bon Homme Richard as that gallant 
vessel sank with her dead in the moment of victory. 
We see John Paul Jones receive in 1778 from the 
French Admiral Piquet on the coast of France the first 
salute of the American flag by a foreign power. In 
the same year we see the capture of the Drake by 
Jones, the first regular man-of-war to strike its colors 
to the American flag. We see the first use of the flag 
in a land battle in August, 1777, at Fort Stanwix in 

37 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

New York, a fort that never surrendered. We see that 
flag in the struggle's front at Brandywine, at German- 
town and Saratoga. We see it in the winter camp at 
Valley Forge, inspiring the half-clad soldiery during 
months of famine and of cold. We see it rallying 
the colonials at Monmouth and leading the assault at 
Stony Point. We see it in a succession of triumphs 
at Camden, at King's Mountain, at Guilford Court 
House, at Eutaw Springs and in the final victory of 
Washington over Cornwallis at Yorktown. We see 
it raised by the wife of an American tavern keeper in 
New York on the day of the British evacuation in 1783. 
A British officer in full uniform orders her to haul it 
down. She refuses and he attempts to lower it him- 
self while the heroic woman belabors him with a broom- 
stick so severely that the powder rises from his wig in 
clouds and he finally gives up the task. Thus we find 
ourselves indebted to an American woman not only 
for the first model of the American flag, but for the 
victorious close of the last battle of the revolutionary 
war. 

It should be noted that in 1784 the American flag 
was first displayed in the Chinese sea by Captain 
Green of the Empress, and that its first journey round 
the globe was completed in 1790 at the masthead of the 
Columbia, John Kendred, captain. It was soon seen 
in the most distant harbors of the earth. In 1794 it 
was suspended by the side of the colors of the French 
republic in the hall of the National Convention at 
Paris. Vermont and Kentucky having been admitted 
to the Union, the flag was changed by act of Congress 
in 1794 to one of fifteen stars and fifteen stripes. It 
was raised at New Orleans in 1803 to mark the transfer 
of the Louisiana domain. It was carried by Lewis and 
Clarke in their remarkable journey beginning in 1806 

38 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

to the source of the Missouri, thence across the Rockies 
and along the Columbia to the Pacific. It was borne 
to victory on the Atlantic, on Lake Champlain, on Lake 
Erie, at Lundy's Lane and New Orleans in the war of 
1812. It was during this contest that Francis Scott 
Key in April, 1814, while witnessing the bombard- 
ment of Fort McHenry composed his immortal ode 
to the flag. The flag floated for the first time over 
a public school on Catamount Hill in Colrain, Massa- 
chusetts, in May of 1812. The admission of additional 
states forcing the question of further changes in the 
flag, Congress declared by law in 1818 that it should 
consist of thirteen red and white stripes and twenty 
stars, representing the existing states, a new star to be 
added for every future state. The law remains today 
as then enacted, the number of stars having grown 
to forty-eight. The flag was given the name of "Old 
Glory" by Captain William Driver at Salem, Massa- 
chusetts, in 1831. 

The flag was planted by Fremont on the summit of 
the Rockies in 1841. It swept to victory after victory 
in the war with Mexico from 1846 to 1848, leading the 
American regiments at Palo Alto, at Buena Vista, at 
Cerro Gordo and Chepultepec. In 1848 it was lifted 
on the snowy summit of Mount Orizaba where the 
footsteps of man had never fallen before. In the same 
year it was borne by an American vessel for the first 
time across the sea of Galilee to the river Jordan 
and thence to the Dead Sea. It was carried by M. C. 
Perry into the harbor of Yokohama in 1854 where was 
negotiated the first treaty opening Japan to foreign 
trade. It was opposed by the Stars and Bars, of glori- 
ous memory, in the civil conflict of the sixties, emerging 
from that giant strife the emblem of a firmer Union. 
It was carried into remotest Africa by Stanley in 1871 

39 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

and raised on one of the loftiest peaks of the Andes by a 
party of American engineers in 1873. It was first 
unfurled on Cuban soil at Guantanamo during the war 
with Spain in 1898 and led the American advance at 
Las Guasimas, at San Juan Hill and Santiago. It 
was glorified in the two principal naval victories of 
that struggle at Manila and Santiago Bay. It was 
the first flag to be raised on the walls of Pekin in the 
assault by the allied armies in 1900. It was displayed 
by miners in the Congress gold mine near Phoenix, 
Ariz., 1,500 feet underground, in honor of a visit by 
McKinley in May, 1901, and in the following September 
from the beginning of McKinley's funeral at Canton 
until sunset an American flag bordered with crepe, sup- 
ported by four enormous kites, floated at a height of 
1,500 feet above Bayonne, New Jersey, as a token of 
mourning. In 1903 the American flag was planted on 
the Himalayas at an altitude it had never before at- 
tained. In 1904 it was raised at Panama to denote the 
initiation by American genius of one of the greatest 
enterprises of all time, and a few years later it became 
the first of all the flags of history to reach the North 
Pole. In April of the present year it again floated 
over Vera Cruz, not for conquest, but for peace. 

The American flag, signal of a people's rights, 
emblem of a people's glory, combining the blue of 
heaven, the white of honor, the red of courage and the 
stars of victory — to the American citizen the proudest 
pennant on the earth! What splendor and what dis- 
tinction radiate from its folds as it floats in lordly 
company with the ensigns of the present and the past — 
with the lilies of France and the lions of Spain, the 
crosses of England and the sun of Japan, the dragon 
of China, the German tri-color and the Austrian crown, 
the eagle of Russia and the wolf of Rome. The Amer- 

40 



At Dedication of New W. O. W. Building 

ican flag, born in honor and in blood, sustained in 
valor and in triumph, symbol of a republic that has 
survived the stress of panic and of war. The American 
flag, eternal as the principle it symbolizes, beautiful as 
the heavens in which it floats. 

Such are the facts and the reflections suggested by 
the dedication of this building. But massive as it 
appears to mortal eyes, imposing as its physical pro- 
portions seem to be, let us not forget that it is only an 
humble symbol of another and a mightier structure — 
the invisible temple of brotherhood reaching from the 
earth to the walls of the New Jerusalem, whose founda- 
tions are the hearts of men and women in every quarter 
of the globe, whose pillars are the songs that rise from 
millions of protected homes, whose altars are the 
prayers that tremble on the lips of universal love. 



IF 



41 



UNVEILING ORATION AT THE 
GRAVE OF ARIAIL. 

IN EVERY age of human history monuments have 
been erected to celebrate the achievements of man. 
Temples, statues, columns, mausoleums, pyramids, 
obelisks and arches have been constructed in every 
period to honor gods and kings. Poets whose songs 
were mirrors of the passions, hopes and glories of 
their time, emperors whose scepters were the symbols 
of universal power, warriors who found the way to 
fame beneath the flashes of the sword, philosophers 
who sought to penetrate the secrets of the stars, 
princes, statesmen, governors, presidents, priests and 
all the others whom the world calls great have received 
the bronze and marble tribute. 

Along the plateau west of ancient Memphis, be- 
tween the valley of the Nile and the sands of the Lib- 
yan desert, stand the pyramids of Egypt. They were 
built in the unwritten past as sepulchers for the royal 
dead. They have remained the unsolved wonders of 
every generation. The method of their construction 
has never been discovered. As to this they are as 
silent as the dead they have sheltered for forty cen- 
turies. They are the tombs of the oldest dynasties and 
together with the ruins of Memphis and of Thebes they 
constitute one of the most sublime remembrances of 
antiquity. 

The sole memorials of the nations that flowered on 
the plains between the Euphrates and the Tigris are 
the fragments of monuments and temples. They alone 
recall the valor of Nimrod, the fame of Urukh, the 
beauty of the goddess Nana, and the splendors of the 
City of Ur. They are the solitary reminiscences of the 

42 



At the Grave of Ariail 



pride of Assyria, the grandeur of Nineveh, and the 
pomp of Babylon. 

The Persians perpetuated the memory of Xerxes 
and Cyrus with palaces and tombs. At Ephesus they 
erected for the worship of Diana, tutelary divinity 
of the city, a temple so vast and splendid that it 
has made its builders as immortal as the goddess 
they strove to honor. Within the temple they placed 
the celebrated statue of Diana which has become uni- 
versally recognized as one of the world's greatest works 
of art. 

The Greeks were especially devoted to the erection 
of shrines and temples for their heroes and their gods. 
Zeus, whose locks but moved to make the god-world 
tremble, was honored with a shrine among the Dodo- 
nian oaks and a temple at Olympia. The Parthenon at 
Athens, constructed under the direction of Phidias to 
commemorate the great men of Greece, is a lasting 
monument of Hellenic genius. 

In Rome monuments and arches rose to preserve 
historic memories. A temple marked the spot where 
stood the pyre of Julius Caesar. The arch of Titus 
on the Sacred Way, glorifying the capture of Jeru- 
salem, and the arch of Constantine, built between 
the Palatine and Celian hills to celebrate the victory 
over Maxentius, still proclaim the glory of Roman 
rulers. The column of Trajan, depicting notable scenes 
in the life of that emperor, was dedicated to him by 
a grateful senate and a thankful people. 

Passing through mediaeval ages, we find that in 
modern times man still delights to do homage to hu- 
man greatness in monumental rnarble. 

The tomb of Napoleon at Paris is one of the most 
imposing tributes the living ever paid the dead. In a 
sarcophagus of porphyry, surrounded by twelve heroic 



43 



At the Grave of Ariail 



figures of victory, Napoleon sleeps. In another and 
perhaps the most beautiful portion of Paris stands one 
of the most magnificent arches of triumph in exist- 
ence. It proclaims the glories of French arms under 
the leadership of Napoleon. It surpasses the arches of 
Rome in magnitude, in design and in effect. In West- 
minster Abbey the distinguished dead of England are 
entombed. Poets, orators, philosophers, explorers, 
warriors, kings and queens lie within this wondrous 
mausoleum. But to mention the monuments in every 
land would be too great a task as every country has 
honored its mighty dead with marble and with bronze. 
But why should not the memory of all men be 
equally preserved? Are not all men born equal and 
in the democracy of death are they not still equal? 
Why is it that pyramids and monuments and temples 
have been erected only for the great? Why should 
the man of the masses be forgotten and the man of the 
crown and throne alone remembered? Are not the 
axe and plough as necessary to mankind as the sword 
and pen? Why then should not all our dead be given 
equal recognition? 

It is strange but true that not until the year 1890 
a body of men arose who resolved, so far as their or- 
ganization was concerned, to permit no unjust and 
artificial distinctions among the living or among the 
dead. That body of men was the Woodmen of the 
World, and over the grave of every deceased Wood- 
man a substantial monument is placed. Every member 
of this order is a Sovereign — a sovereign who sits not 
on a throne, but who has enthroned within his heart 
the principles of love, of honor and of remembrance — 
a sovereign with no crown of gold or iron on his brow, 
but with the crown of all the virtues, brotherhood, in 
his soul. In dedicating monuments to our dead we 

44 



At the Grave of Ariail 



commemorate only their qualities of benevolence and 
usefulness, covering whatever imperfections may have 
been their mortal portion with the mantle of charity. 
And in unveiling this monument today we do not ask 
what social station may have been occupied by the 
dead. We do not inquire as to whether he ever wore 
the trappings of earthly fame. It is sufficient for us 
to know that he was sovereign, citizen, husband, 
father, friend. These are the noblest titles man ever 
bore. 

Standing beside the tomb of a departed Sovereign 
it is well that we should profit by the lessons of this 
hour. Death is as profound a mystery today as at the 
dawn of time. The centuries have witnessed countless 
efforts to discover the land beyond this sphere but 
there is no Columbus of the grave. The achievements 
of science and the researches of philosophy are power- 
less alike to solve the enigma of dissolution. The light 
of progress that has penetrated so many abysses of 
human ignorance beats in vain upon the tomb. Death 
is the one monarch whom revolutions cannot conquer, 
the one ruler whose kingdom ever widens. His pale 
and silent subjects rise not to question his authority. 
We are as helpless beneath his sway as weeds in the 
sweeping seas. 

Death comes to man in myriad forms. It is at 
times an angel smiling a welcome to the skies; again 
it is a demon frowning a summons to hell. It is to 
some a cradle of unending peace; to some a Procrust- 
ean bed of pain. It is the conqueror of time, the 
herald and the despot of eternity. Men have met its 
approach with courage, or have recoiled with horror 
from its touch. It confronted Caesar in the Roman 
senate, but could not with assassination awe that soul 
imperial. 



45 



At the Grave of Ariail 



"Ingratitude more strong than traitors' arms, 
Quite vanquished him; then burst his mighty heart, 
And in his mantle muffling up his face, 
E'en at the base of Pompey's statue, 
Which all the while ran blood, great Caesar fell." 

But how unlike the first of Caesars died the last! 
Great Julius entered the realms of death as if he were 
but changing kingdoms — while Nero, who had mur- 
dered the good and brave of Rome, fled like a coward 
to the grave. Death never ended the mortal life of 
a more valiant spirit than that of Anne Boleyn, wife of 
Henry VIII, and mother of Elizabeth. Approaching 
the block to which she had been condemned by order of 
the king, she sent this message to him from the tomb : 
"Tell the king that he is constant in advancing me to 
the greatest of honors ; from a private gentlewoman he 
made me a marchioness ; from that degree he made me 
a queen ; and now because he can raise me no higher in 
this world is translating me to heaven to wear a crown 
of martyrdom in eternal glory." 

The problem of death is the torture of the brain 
and the terror of the soul. The dread with which the 
herald of decay has ever been regarded is expressed 
among all peoples in death-songs weird and sad. They 
are touching protests against death's tyrannous caprice. 
Death takes the maiden in the freshness and the charm 
of dawning beauty. It destroys the youth upon whose 
brow is set the promise of a proud career. Its shadow 
falls across the fireside where the circle of domestic 
joy has been unbroken ; across congresses and thrones ; 
across banquet halls where revel rages and laughter 
rings beneath the glitter of goblet and chandelier. It 
is present on the battlefield where its image gleams in 
burst of shell, in flame of cannon and in flash of sword. 
It rides upon the lightning and dwells within the 

46 



At the Grave of Ariail 



storm. It lurks within the fairest flower, the gentlest 
breeze. 

How powerless and frail is man — a pigmy on a 
tiny island in infinity's shoreless sea! Surrounded by 
an eternity of silence, an immensity peopled with end- 
less multitudes of undiscovered worlds, his life a 
momentary sigh, whipped with tempest and scourged 
with fire, what is it that enables him to strive and 
hope? What is it that enables him to conduct with 
so much vigor and success the vast enterprises of 
civilization? What is it that leads him to form 
societies, to enact laws, to fashion governments, to 
build churches, palaces and schools? What is it 
that makes possible his high state of moral and 
material culture? The progress of the race, the 
preservation of order, the practice of moral principle 
are due to the conviction born of faith that death is 
not the end of life. It is the general belief in the exist- 
ence of God and the immortality of the soul that keeps 
government alive and society intact. The absence of 
such belief would mean anarchy and night more fright- 
ful than the prophecies of Adamaster, the spirit of the 
stormy cape. The atrocities of that period of the 
French revolution in which God was abandoned and 
reason deified show how necessary to the preservation 
of life and order is religious belief. 

In the light of these facts it is strange and sad that 
men should at times attack the foundations of society 
by questioning God and immortality. The existence 
of God is written on every granite page of nature. It 
is inscribed on leaf and stream, on planet and on cloud. 
It is proclaimed by every mountain peak, trumpeted 
by every cataract, reflected in every sunset and mir- 
rored in every star. It is demonstrated by the progress 
of mankind and the advance of Christianity. God 

47 



At the Grave of Ariail 



speaks to man in every flower whose perfume woos 
the enamored air. He speaks through unnumbered 
worlds in the limitless reaches of the empyrean. He 
speaks through forests, prodigals of shelter and shade, 
through rivers and seas whose bosoms bear the com- 
merce of the world. He speaks in the thunders of 
Niagara and in the towering glory of the Alps. He 
speaks in every rainbow that the sunlight kisses from 
the mists. He speaks in the splendor of every perfect 
day and in the astral beauty of every matchless night. 
He speaks in the enginery of steam that has un- 
moored continents and anchored them side by side. 
He speaks in the electric current that carries the 
thought of man in an instant round the world. He 
speaks in the adjustment and adaptitude of the ma- 
chinery of the human body — in the delicate arrange- 
ment, important function and mutual dependence of 
the brain and heart. He speaks in government, in 
science, in architecture, in art, in law. His existence 
is engraved upon the sky; it is imprinted on the soul, 
and the fact of His being neither parliaments nor peo- 
ples may with impunity disregard. 

The immortality of the soul is equally impressed 
upon the mind and heart of man. The hope of im- 
mortality springs from the deepest feeling of the soul, 
the feeling of kinship with eternity. It is the most 
powerful and beneficent influence that operates upon 
the motives, the passions, the habits and the aspira- 
tions of humanity. It is the principal pillar of society, 
the chief inspiration of art. It relieves the despair of 
philosophy and touches the poet's pen with fire. It is 
sweeter than the music with which the angels salute 
their God. It makes of death a gateway — not a wall; 
a portal to everlasting bliss. It is the grandest prom- 
ise of divinity. It is taught in the Woodman ritual 

48 



At the Grave of Ariail 



and exemplified in our burial and unveiling ceremo- 
nies. The dove we liberate from the open grave is the 
emblem of the soul as it rises into life immortal. 

But the monument we unveil today typifies the 
practical advantages as well as the principles of 
Woodcraft. No Woodman rests "unknelled, uncof- 
fined and unknown." It is an unspeakable consolation 
to know that we shall be remembered after death; to 
feel that because of our membership in this great 
order, if for no other reason, our names will not im- 
mediately fade from the recollection of the living. And 
it is sweeter still to know that those who are de- 
pendent on us will not suffer when we shall have been 
gathered to the dust; to know that when the arm 
that fought the struggle of existence lies nerveless 
in the grave our loved ones will be protected, our 
homes preserved. 

It is due to facts like these that the Woodmen of 
the World has grown with such rapidity since its 
organization in 1890. This order teaches in an elo- 
quent ritual the principles of liberty, equality, fra- 
ternity. The greatest of these is fraternity, for with- 
out fraternity liberty and equality cannot exist. Lib- 
erty cannot exist without fraternity. Man must call 
man brother before man will take up arms in defense 
of man. Equality cannot exist without fraternity. 
Man must call man brother before man becomes the 
equal of man. The history of the world may be thus 
epitomized: Man called man master, and there was 
tyranny ; man called man brother, and there was liberty. 

We have met today to dedicate the monument of 
Sovereign Julius Fellows Ariail, who was one of the 
most distinguished and useful members of the Sover- 
eign Camp, the supreme legislative body of the Wood- 
men of the World. He was born at Alexandria, Loui- 

49 



At the Grave of Ariail 



siana, in 1863. Here was his cradle and here is his 
grave. Here he first caught wondering view of the day- 
god's fire and here he faded into the eternal sleep. He 
attended the University of Louisiana and Vanderbilt. 
He became a member of the Kappa Alpha fraternity. 
Vividly do I recall how my heart leaped with ecstasy 
when I found on first meeting Ariail at the Sovereign 
Camp in St. Louis that he was a member of Kappa 
Alpha, a knight of the crimson and gold, a brother even 
at the altar. In the Sovereign Camp and in the legis- 
lature of Louisiana he displayed profound attributes 
of statesmanship as well as unusual gifts of oratory. 
He was as generous as he was gentle, as modest as 
he was true. His was an attractive, a popular and 
an incorruptible manhood. With an intellect of 
decided power, an address and bearing of natural 
dignity, he combined a heart as responsive to the 
tenderer impulses as a harp to the sweep of an angel's 
wing. His devotion to his wife and children finds 
glowing illustration in a Woodmen certificate. Upon 
his buried head will never fall the curses of neglected 
love. He knew how fragile was the thread of life; 
how uncertain the hour of his summons to the clay. 
He showed his appreciation of the kindness of God 
in crowning his years with a lovely and loving family 
by protecting them against the emergency of his death. 
He has earned the quiet slumber of the dreamless 
grave. May peace dwell with his ashes; seraphs with 
his soul. 

And may we all depart from this impressive scene, 
the music of a sweeter hope within our souls. Beyond 
the glimmer of the skies are palaces of rest. Beyond 
the curtains of the clouds all those whom death has 
separated for a time shall meet to part and die no 
more. In the cities of the blest there is no death, but 



50 



At the Grave of Ariail 



there is life eternal, happiness supreme. And the wife 
and children of the sovereign whose monument we 
dedicate today may dwell with rapture upon the com- 
ing of the hour when they shall repose again upon the 
bosom of husband and of father. And together with 
all the resurrected race of man they shall for joy out- 
sing the morning stars upon the breaking of day "when 
the seed the grave entombeth bursts to glory from 
the clay." 



^ 



51 



THE GOSPEL OF WOODCRAFT. 

THE last half of the nineteenth century will for- 
ever rank as one of the fundamental epochs in 
the world's advancement. In the estimation of 
the present it is notable chiefly for the almost universal 
application of mechanical forces to the various phases 
of human industry. It was undoubtedly the cardinal 
half century of inventive genius. The development of 
machinery was carried to such an extent that today al- 
most everything in the world may be made or unmade 
by pressing a button or turning a crank except debts 
and taxes, divorce and death. Perhaps we are yet 
to have a machine which for a nickel in the slot will 
produce a receipt for taxes and debts, a marriage license 
or a divorce, a burial permit, a pair of wings and a 
clear abstract of title to a mansion in the skies. The 
advent of the mechanical appliance made production 
and manufacture possible on so prodigious a scale, 
concentration of energy and union of control to so 
enormous an extent that industrial monopolies arose 
surpassing in wealth and power the wildest conjectures 
of the past. The principal scenes of human action, the 
centers of human interest were transferred from the 
council chamber, the pulpit, the forum, the university 
and the court to the counting room and the stock ex- 
change. The millionaire supplanted the orator, the 
statesman, the divine, the judge in the regard of men; 
the dollar-mark eclipsed the cross. Then followed an 
idolatry of the rich, a modern paganism more revolt- 
ing than all the superstitions of antiquity. Patten, in 
the wheat pit at Chicago, pale and breathless as mil- 
lions accumulate and the price of bread grows dearer; 
Morgan restoring the trembling edifice of finance while 

52 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



the mere fact that he takes a cup of coffee at 2 o'clock 
in the morning is cabled to the remotest sections of 
the earth; Rockefeller fixing the price of one of life's 
necessities, in this morbid era an object of such inter- 
est that his ordinary movements are noted in the As- 
sociated Press, are truer symbols of modern ideals and 
tendencies than Jefferson composing the gospel of a 
nation's liberties or Washington declining an empire 
to resume the labors of the farm. The worship of 
the simple virtues of a better age is almost lost amid 
the stir and storm of modern business, just as the spire 
of old Trinity in the city of New York is now far 
overtopped by walls of gain. Indeed, the swiftness 
of the time has in some sections of the country 
affected the pulpit and it is said that a certain modern 
evangelist tells the familiar story of David and Goliath 
in this way: "And so David's pa comes up to him 
where he was working in the field and says: 'Dave, 
better go up to the house. Your ma's anxious about 
the other boys fightin' in the army, hasn't heard from 
them by phone or anything, and she'd like you should 
look them up.' So Dave hops on a trolley and hikes 
to the front, and stays there with his brothers over 
night. 

"In the morning old Goliath comes out in front of 
the Philistines and dares the Israelites to fight him. 

" 'Who's that big stiff makin' all the big talk out 
there?' asks Dave. 

" 'Why, that's the head cheese, the big noise,' says 
his brothers. 

" 'Why don't someone soak him one?' asks Dave. 

" 'We've all got cold feet,' says the Israelites. 

" 'You fellers make me tired,' says Dave, and he 
pikes out to the brook, gets five pebbles in his shep- 
herd's sack, slams one at Goliath, and soaks him in the 

53 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



coco between the lamps. Goliath goes to the mat, 
takes the count, and Dave pokes him in the slats, 
chops off his block and the whole Philistine gang 
skidooed." 

There is evidence, however, at the close of this, the 
first decade of the twentieth century, of a reaction 
against the materialism that dominates the earth. The 
reaction finds one of its most prolific sources in the 
system of fraternal insurance and the vast and grow- 
ing organizations in which the system finds expres- 
sion. It is a system combining the noblest doctrines 
and the most practical methods for the elevation of 
humanity, a fabric that must have been woven by the 
fingers of God. It represents the largest and most suc- 
cessful application the principle of brotherhood has yet 
received in human institutions. It teaches co-opera- 
tion, equality, love and peace ; it exemplifies these basic 
conceptions in providing payments from a common 
treasury to dependent ones in the black hour of the 
provider's death. Thus it perpetuates the family and 
preserves the home. Thus it strengthens the founda- 
tions of society. 

It is a fact of more than ordinary importance, per- 
haps of heavenly ordainment, that the second half of 
the nineteenth century, an age with arms of steel, 
ideals of brass and heart of stone, an age of enormous 
physical development and measureless financial power, 
an age of machinery, monopoly and millionaires, an age 
in which material success became the dominating as- 
piration of society, should have witnessed the advent 
in the United States of fraternal insurance, a move- 
ment opposed in every sense to the reigning tendencies 
of the time, teaching that true wealth is of the soul, 
that the protection of the home is humanity's proudest 
goal, that the grasp of grateful hands, the kiss of lov- 

54 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



ing lips, the flash of tender eyes, the rosary of baby 
fingers, the timid march of little feet, the glow of the 
fireside, the pure communion of the family circle are 
worth far more to earth and heaven than banks and 
bonds and palaces. Surely the hand of God raised up 
this system to lead mankind out of deserts where the 
rain of the spirit never falls into the holy land of broth- 
erhood and peace. And when in cities, fields and plains, 
on every wall and peak and tower the white standards 
of fraternal love shall rise and man shall measure man 
by principle, not by pelf, by merit, not by mammon, by 
true godliness, not gain, the last half of the nineteenth 
century will be remarkable, not so much for its ma- 
terial glory as for the fact that it witnessed the birth 
in the United States of practical fraternity. One of the 
most notable days in fraternal records was October 27, 
1868, the day that marked the organization of one of 
the first fraternal insurance orders in the United States. 
By the close of 1878 seventeen additional orders 
had been established, six having been founded in 1877, 
the banner year of the first decade. The succeeding 
decade witnessed a more active growth and marked the 
organization of thirty-seven additional orders, eight 
having been founded in 1879, seven in 1883. The third 
decade in the history of American fraternal insurance, 
the decade ending in the year 1898, saw the advent of 
nearly seventy organizations, fifteen having been es- 
tablished in 1897 alone, the banner number and the 
banner year for all decades since 1868. The year 1890 
saw the birth of the Woodmen of the World, an order 
second only in numbers to any other today, and in that 
respect to one alone, to one seven years its senior — 
and absolutely first in reserve accumulations, in con- 
servatism of management and plan, in beauty of ritual- 
ism and in rapidity of growth. The fourth decade, the 

55 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



decade ending with 1908, witnessed the rise of nearly 
sixty insurance orders proper, nine having been found- 
ed in 1902 and nine in 1903. Of course many other or- 
ganizations claiming to be fraternal insurance institu- 
tions were inaugurated during the period just described, 
but for the most part they were ephemeral or purely lo- 
cal. I have referred to practically all of the substantial 
and typical representatives of the fraternal system of 
insurance in the United States. The first forty years 
of the fraternal system constituted a period of birth- 
struggle, reformation, self-correction, self-analysis, a 
period marked by a resolution that deepened with every 
difficulty and rose with every storm. 

The energetic and self-sacrificing men and women 
who had in charge the various orders at no time dis- 
played the indifference exhibited by a certain laborer in 
a potato patch in one of the southwestern states. Ac- 
cording to a story current there this laborer was sit- 
ting listlessly on a stump in the middle of the patch 
when a tourist rode up and asked in a rather bantering 
tone: "My friend, why don't you go to work?" 
"Don't have to, stranger; never worked a day in my 
life." "If that's true," asked the tourist, "who cut down 
these trees?" "Why, stranger, that's where a cyclone 
come along and saved me the trouble of cuttin' 'em 
down." "What do all these ashes mean?" persisted 
the tourist. "Why, stranger, that's where the lightnin' 
set fire to a brush pile and saved me the trouble of 
burnin' it." "Well," gasped the astounded tourist, 
"what are you doing now?" "Why, stranger, I'm jest 
waitin' for an earthquake to come along and shake 
these potatoes out of the ground." 

The original plans of almost all the insurance orders 
were faulty, immature, unscientific, some so much so 
that certain orders are still suffering from failure to 

56 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



take corrective steps in time. The enemies of our sys- 
tem still point to the experience and condition of a few 
unfortunate orders as an evidence of fundamental weak- 
ness. But the system is today a successful, growing, 
and uplifting factor in the life of this republic. Its 
origin was an impulse of the soul, not a deduction of 
the brain, a throb of the heart, not a calculation of the 
mind, a cry for help, not a theorem in geometry. On 
October 27, 1868, a solitary hand reached out into the 
darkness of the time, the hand of Upchurch, founder 
of one of the first American fraternal insurance orders. 
It was soon grasped by another hand. Then followed 
others, and still others, until within the little circle thus 
begun were enkindled the vestal fires of fellow-love. 
Through the marching years the circle widened, the 
altar flames leaped higher, until today nearly 7,000,000 
American citizens join hands and hearts to glorify the 
cause of human brotherhood. Counting dependent 
ones, we may truly say that 35,000,000 of the 
American people are massed beneath the banners of the 
fraternal insurance system. Let me say here that in 
England the active membership in friendly societies, 
societies corresponding to our fraternal insurance 
orders, now reaches the astounding total of over 
fourteen million six hundred thousand, or about half 
the entire population of the kingdom, with accumu- 
lated funds exceeding 260 million dollars. Adding 
those dependent on the active members, we have 
practically the whole English people in substantial 
affiliation with these fraternal insurance bodies. In 
many other countries the fraternal principle is making 
rapid progress in the line of self-governing insurance 
organizations. No movement or crusade in all the 
past can approach this system in point of numbers, in 
point of permanence, in point of actual good. Our 

57 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



system has distributed among the people of the United 
States nearly 1300 million dollars, a sum greater by 
300 millions than our entire national indebtedness. It 
is now distributing over a hundred millions a year, 
each year witnessing a larger distribution than the 
last. The mere recital of these gigantic totals will 
suggest the homes our system has preserved, the fire- 
sides it has restored, the tears it has transformed to 
smiles. 

Our feet are planted on the rock of pure insurance, 
our guiding principle being the payment of a sum to 
the stricken family after death and the elimination of 
waste and unnecessary cost. We hold that endow- 
ments, surrender values, loans and other forms of 
speculation which the commercial companies com- 
bine with pure insurance increase the cost beyond 
the reach of the myriads whose earnings proceed 
from daily toil. These added elements are not gifts; 
it is as necessary to pay for them as for the insur- 
ance itself. Besides, they obscure the real purpose 
of insurance which is for others, not for self. They 
distort and frequently destroy the true lesson of insur- 
ance which, disassociated from these selfish elements, 
is a concrete and impressive example of real brother- 
hood. The elimination of every suggestion of invest- 
ment in the interest of the policyholder except the old 
age benefit which many orders have and which stands 
in a class apart and justifies itself, the representative 
form of government prevailing in every typical fra- 
ternal order, the enthusiasm and devotion of member- 
ship arising from every phase of fraternal feeling and 
association, from the performance of attractive and in- 
structive ceremonies, including degree work, anniver- 
saries, memorials and the like, from ministrations to 
the sick, the needy, the distressed — this enthusiasm and 

58 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



devotion constituting an agency force which the com- 
panies with unlimited millions cannot hope to rival — 
all these unite to reduce the expense of conducting the 
insurance order to a minimum and to enable the in- 
stitution to provide insurance at almost actual, scien- 
tific cost. Thus fraternal insurance is pre-eminently 
the insurance of the masses and is rapidly becoming the 
chief bulwark of the American home. The twenty-five 
leading old line insurance companies of the United 
States had a total income of 484^ millions in 1908, a 
total disbursement for death claims and endowments 
of nearly 146 millions, and an expense of management 
amounting to nearly 44 millions. The twenty-five 
leading fraternal insurance orders had a total income 
of a little over 65% millions in 1908, a total disburse- 
ment for death claims, benefits, etc., of nearly 49 mil- 
lions, and an expense of management of $3,700,000. 
Thus out of every dollar the twenty-five leading com- 
panies collected from the people in 1908 they returned 
about 30 cents; out of every dollar the twenty-five 
leading orders collected from the people they returned 
over 71 cents. Other years show about the same 
proportion. 

Conspicuous among the exponents of fraternal 
insurance, in many respects its pilot-star, is the Wood- 
men of the World, an order founded in 1890 at Omaha, 
Nebraska, by Joseph Cullen Root, the foremost fra- 
ternalist of his time, and now concluding the twentieth 
years of its remarkable history. In this short period of 
precocious youth it has acquired a membership in all 
its branches approaching 750,000, a membership now 
growing at the rate of 10,000 a month, and has distrib- 
uted in death claims nearly 50 million dollars. It has 
accumulated an emergency fund in all its jurisdictions 
approximating 13 millions, a fund increasing at the 

59 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



system has distributed among the people of the United 
States nearly 1300 million dollars, a sum greater by 
300 millions than our entire national indebtedness. It 
is now distributing over a hundred millions a year, 
each year witnessing a larger distribution than the 
last. The mere recital of these gigantic totals will 
suggest the homes our system has preserved, the fire- 
sides it has restored, the tears it has transformed to 
smiles. 

Our feet are planted on the rock of pure insurance, 
our guiding principle being the payment of a sum to 
the stricken family after death and the elimination of 
waste and unnecessary cost. We hold that endow- 
ments, surrender values, loans and other forms of 
speculation which the commercial companies com- 
bine with pure insurance increase the cost beyond 
the reach of the myriads whose earnings proceed 
from daily toil. These added elements are not gifts; 
it is as necessary to pay for them as for the insur- 
ance itself. Besides, they obscure the real purpose 
of insurance which is for others, not for self. They 
distort and frequently destroy the true lesson of insur- 
ance which, disassociated from these selfish elements, 
is a concrete and impressive example of real brother- 
hood. The elimination of every suggestion of invest- 
ment in the interest of the policyholder except the old 
age benefit which many orders have and which stands 
in a class apart and justifies itself, the representative 
form of government prevailing in every typical fra- 
ternal order, the enthusiasm and devotion of member- 
ship arising from every phase of fraternal feeling and 
association, from the performance of attractive and in- 
structive ceremonies, including degree work, anniver- 
saries, memorials and the like, from ministrations to 
the sick, the needy, the distressed — this enthusiasm and 

58 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



devotion constituting an agency force which the com- 
panies with unlimited millions cannot hope to rival — 
all these unite to reduce the expense of conducting the 
insurance order to a minimum and to enable the in- 
stitution to provide insurance at almost actual, scien- 
tific cost. Thus fraternal insurance is pre-eminently 
the insurance of the masses and is rapidly becoming the 
chief bulwark of the American home. The twenty-five 
leading old line insurance companies of the United 
States had a total income of 484^4 millions in 1908, a 
total disbursement for death claims and endowments 
of nearly 146 millions, and an expense of management 
amounting to nearly 44 millions. The twenty-five 
leading fraternal insurance orders had a total income 
of a little over Q5 Z A millions in 1908, a total disburse- 
ment for death claims, benefits, etc., of nearly 49 mil- 
lions, and an expense of management of $3,700,000. 
Thus out of every dollar the twenty-five leading com- 
panies collected from the people in 1908 they returned 
about 30 cents; out of every dollar the twenty-five 
leading orders collected from the people they returned 
over 71 cents. Other years show about the same 
proportion. 

Conspicuous among the exponents of fraternal 
insurance, in many respects its pilot-star, is the Wood- 
men of the World, an order founded in 1890 at Omaha, 
Nebraska, by Joseph Cullen Root, the foremost fra- 
ternalist of his time, and now concluding the twentieth 
years of its remarkable history. In this short period of 
precocious youth it has acquired a membership in all 
its branches approaching 750,000, a membership now 
growing at the rate of 10,000 a month, and has distrib- 
uted in death claims nearly 50 million dollars. It has 
accumulated an emergency fund in all its jurisdictions 
approximating 13 millions, a fund increasing at the 

59 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



rate of a million and a half to two millions every year, 
and adding every hour new strength to the founda- 
tions of the institution. Over 25,000 monuments at the 
graves of deceased members proclaim its devotion to 
the dead. I count it an especial favor to be an officer 
in such an institution. As much as I appreciate my 
membership in the American Congress, I would rather 
aid in preserving one humble American home than to 
be the author of all the laws in the political history of 
the United States. From coast to coast the fires of 
12,000 Woodmen camps are blazing and around them 
are gathered the loyal hosts of Woodcraft to exem- 
plify its ritual, to reconsecrate its altars, to prepare for 
new and greater things. Associated with us is our 
woman's auxiliary, the Woodmen Circle, which under 
the inspired leadership of that great woman fraternal- 
ist, Mrs. Emma B. Manchester, has achieved extraor- 
dinary success. 

It is reported that a professor of astronomy at 
Harvard university has ascertained that at a cost of 
ten million dollars he can with powerful mirrors de- 
velop sufficient fires to signal the inhabitants of Mars. 
Let the professor possess his ambitious soul in 
peace. In a few more years there will be sufficient 
Woodmen camp fires in the United States to sig- 
nal every planet in the universe. And what nobler 
project could be devised than to have the first signals 
that reach another world carry with the message of 
our existence the message of Woodcraft and fraternity ? 

States and nations regard with especial veneration 
the places of their birth. The spot where a great 
movement may be said to have arisen, a great principle 
to have been conceived, a religion or a crusade to have 
derived initial impetus is clothed with memories and 
traditions that grow more sacred with the years. If 

60 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



the cause it cradled awakens the devotion of mankind 
and writes new chapters in the history of the world it 
gains an everlasting significance and fame. It is only 
natural, therefore, that we, the members of an organi- 
zation that has filled ten thousand American homes 
with the radiance of Paradise, should reverently turn 
to that city by the Missouri where twenty years ago 
was born a republic of kindness, a nation of love, the 
Woodmen of the World. For what Verdun, where be- 
gan the two most progressive nations of continental 
Europe, signifies to Germany and to France, what the 
lonely landing on the isle of Thanet nearly fifteen cen- 
turies ago implies to every English soul, what James- 
town and Plymouth Rock, where Puritan and Cavalier 
first trod the soil of liberty, mean to American hearts, 
nay, what Bethlehem, the star-sought cradle of the child 
divine, denotes to Christian hosts, Omaha is to Wood- 
craft, to Woodcraft, one of the purest embodiments of 
benevolence and love humanity has yet seen. It is a 
fact gratifying beyond expression to every Woodman 
and illuminating beyond all argument to every observer 
of current affairs that of the 956,000 new members ad- 
mitted into fraternal insurance orders in the United 
States in 1908 practically 140,000 allied themselves 
with the Woodmen of the World and its various 
branches, about one-seventh of the entire number of 
American initiates in 1908. In 1909, out of a million 
and fifty thousand initiates, over 140,000 joined the 
Woodmen of the World and its auxiliaries. We have 
achieved this remarkable success because every mem- 
ber of the order worthy of the name of member is 
an aggressive and fearless apostle of Woodcraft, a 
preacher of its gospels, an illustration of its teachings. 
His activity and enthusiasm attract attention, inspire 
confidence and keep the order ever uppermost in the 

61 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



public eye and heart. The work of the true Woodman 
suggests the story of the minister who, after serving as 
a missionary in India, returned to a charge in a small 
town in the United States. He brought back some of 
the hottest sauce for which the Orient is famous and 
kept his own supply, having become accustomed to the 
sauce while abroad. One day a friend whom he had 
invited to dine noticed the strange sauce, a sauce, by 
the way, that would make tabasco seem as weak as 
water, and not knowing its torrid character, asked to be 
allowed to try it. Without waiting for a reply and be- 
fore anyone could restrain him, he poured a liberal por- 
tion of the sauce upon his meat and bolted down a 
large quantity. With tears streaming down his cheeks, 
with lips burning almost beyond endurance, he gasped 
out to the preacher: "You say you are a minister of 
the gospel?" "Yes." "And you preach hell and damna- 
tion?" "Yes." "Well, you are the first minister I ever 
saw that carried samples." Woodcraft carries its own 
samples and we thus impress our competitors. 

Never shall I forget the emotions of delight that 
thrilled my being when first I heard of Woodcraft 
and its teachings; of its matchless ritual; of its 
conservative plan; its accumulative certificate, re- 
quiring membership for two years before paying the 
entire amount, thus encouraging the new, safeguard- 
ing the old and faithful member; of its emergency 
fund, the principal pillar of the institution; of its old 
age benefit, instancing the love and care of Woodcraft 
for the veterans of the bloodless but bitter wars of 
peace; of its funeral rites, emblemizing the true sig- 
nificance of life and death and brotherhood; of its 
monuments at every member's grave, earth's finest 
symbol of fraternity ! 

62 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



"Then felt I like some watcher of the skies, 
When a new planet swims into his ken; 

Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes 
He stared at the Pacific — and all his men 

Look'd at each other with a wild surmise, 
Silent upon a peak in Darien." 

Woodcraft is the crown jewel of fraternity, the 
most priceless gem in the infinite treasury of brother- 
hood. As the master workman with unrelaxing effort 
shapes and polishes the ungainly stone until it glistens 
with the velvet laughter of the sapphire, the ruby's 
blush, the modest glances of the emerald, the colors 
of the onyx, or the wanton brilliancy of the diamond, 
so Woodcraft moulds all character into gentleness, 
humility, dignity and love. Woodcraft is a silent 
force that lifts humanity ever higher. The whole fra- 
ternal movement is one of quiet yet prodigious 
strength. It is comparatively unnoticed in these clam- 
orous hours of sensation and display. The navies of 
the world ride in competing splendor on the roads of 
Hampton. The evolutions of every ship are shouted 
to remotest lands. Detachments of soldiers in Man- 
churia, squadrons in Montenegro, regiments in South 
Africa or battalions in St. Petersburg are ordered on 
some dramatic mission and giant headlines blacken the 
columns of the universal press. When doumas, reichs- 
tags, parliaments, legislatures, congresses assemble 
or dissolve, the world gives eager audience. The race 
track, the amusement park, the prize ring, the athletic 
field lie in the limelight of the public gaze. Elec- 
tions and campaigns arouse unnumbered millions to 
excessive frenzy, while blare of bands, star-bursts of 
fire and flags salute the installation of a president or 
the crowning of a king. In comparison with these 
loud-tongued events our meetings in the country 

63 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



school houses, the second stories in the towns and other 
humble places are practically unheralded and unac- 
claimed. And yet we represent a power more vast and 
lasting than that of all the navies, armies, parliaments 
and potentates of earth. The situation has its counter- 
part in nature. There the strongest forces are the 
most silent ones. Think of the hydraulic power of a 
sunbeam. It lifts through the noiseless process of 
evaporation volumes of water equal to all the seas as 
high as the loftiest clouds. The days may be as tran- 
quil, the oceans as peaceful, the sky and air as still 
as if the universe were a monastery asleep and yet the 
enginery of the sunbeam is in motion, exerting a force 
which all the mechanical contrivances of man and all 
the other elements of nature can never equal. Temp- 
ests may lash the seas to insurrection till continents 
quiver and not a ship survives, but never does the 
gossamer machinery of the light suspend and the re- 
bellious torrent rises at its touch to mingle obediently 
with the skies and obediently to descend as dew and 
snow and rain. So Woodcraft is quietly elevating 
man to nobler heights, preparing him for the better 
service of his country and the greater glory of his God, 
while armies pose and statesmen boast and navies 
strut the seas amid the braggart thunders of saluting 
cannon. 

Woodcraft is typical of the fraternal impulse that 
seems to animate all nature. As the perpetual cycle of 
sea and cloud and rain and river rebuilds and fructifies 
the land, sustains and nurtures every form of life, so 
every change and phase in the physical structure of the 
globe promotes some useful function. In the benefi- 
ciary society of nature every atom is insured against 
both idleness and annihilation. Its form may change 
but its substance never perishes. Nature insures re- 

64 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



production on a constantly improving scale. It per- 
mits no form of life to fade or change without upbuild- 
ing some higher and more useful form. It remains for 
man alone to allow the home, the source of social 
stability and life, to be destroyed, its influence to be 
subverted. Scientists inform us that in the dimmest 
past, when the earth was liquid, there gathered on its 
rocking surface limitless billions of tiny organisms with 
such powers of multiplication that the shells of those 
that perished, accumulating through uncounted centu- 
ries, formed the solid crust of earth and slowly builded 
hill and cliff and gorge and mountain. It would re- 
quire the acumen of a god to measure the industry 
with which these pygmies of the deep labored through 
the ages to construct the physical environment of man. 
An analysis of the formations of the Alps, the Pyrenees, 
the Carpathians, the Egyptian sphynx, the pyramid of 
Cheops, the sands of the Indies shows these diminu- 
tive creatures to have been the elemental substance. 
They erected the promontories of Southern England 
that repulse the charges of the German seas. Today 
they rear fantastic isles and edifices in the bosom of 
the main, swarm in all the empires of the waters, 
changing the oceans' depths, regulating its properties, 
maintaining its equilibrium. What an example of 
co-operation! These, the first-born of the physical 
creation, the pioneer fraternalists of time, beings so 
small that the eye unaided cannot perceive them, 
become through united action the master-builders of 
the globe. 

The brotherhood of nature is further emphasized 
in the constant circulation of the same properties 
through earth and air and sea, through every physi- 
cal object, every animal organization. Such is the 
fraternal spirit in nature that no particle of matter, 

65 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



however small, is ever lost. It may in the flight of 
aeons beome a part of every animate and inanimate 
existence. Prisoned for centuries in the loftiest peak, 
it may be liberated by the wear of time to join some 
river in a journey to the plains. Here it may mingle 
with the soil to nourish roots and plants and trees. 
It may rise in grasses that sustain the herds on which 
mankind depends. 

Thus it may pass into the human body, compose 
a human heart and beat with happiness and pain. Thus 
what is now blood of our blood and flesh of our flesh 
may have reposed for ages in summits old in story, 
and what is now this restless heart may on the dim to- 
morrow of the years impel some restless billow to re- 
sist the storm. The same ingredient successively may 
dwell in wind and tide, in leaf and stone, in cloud and 
temple, in the radiance of a sunset and the glitter of a 
gem, in the tint of a pearl and the cheek of an houri, 
in the petal of a flower and the azure of a wing. 

"I sometimes think that never grows so red 
The rose as where some buried Caesar bled; 
That every hyacinth the garden wears 
Dropped in her lap from some once lovely head." 

Such is the constant intermingling, the endless fra- 
ternizing of all the elements of nature ! So beneficent 
and complete is the scheme of brotherhood in nature 
that the existence of the smallest plant is united with 
that of continent and mountain. In order that the 
diminutive flower we call the snowdrop might incline 
its tiny head to assure its regeneration the weight of the 
earth had to be taken into the most precise account. 
Such is its constitution that at a certain period of 
growth it bows its fragile petals to renew its kind and 
then must stand erect again to continue its existence. 

66 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



The strength needed by its fibers to perform this 
process must bear an eternal and exact proportion to 
the weight and size of earth, the force of gravity. The 
slightest alteration in either element would make the 
vitalizing act impossible. 

That this little plant might live the globe was 
measured and a mighty eye surveys the world and all 
the convulsions of the ages, the floods, the fires, the 
upheavals of hemispheres and oceans are not permitted 
to violate by the influence of a hair the equilibrium on 
which its life depends. 

We observe that the co-operation of the physical 
forces of the world is planned with particular reference 
to the preservation of these forces and their reproduc- 
tion. In human society the co-operation of men has 
a similar objective. The preservation of the home, the 
fundamental unit of the social structure, the firmest 
pillar of the race, is the highest goal of associated ef- 
fort, the cause and the foundation of the state. And 
the Woodmen of the World in reducing to scientific 
certainty the protection of the home performs the su- 
perbest task in the whole social economy. It repeats 
the principle on which God founded all the lands and 
seas. Governments may die, confederacies dissolve, 
boundaries disappear, but the masses of the people 
are preserved because the home endures. 

Revolutions, invasions, conquests, devastations of 
flame and flood have overwhelmed mankind to beat in 
vain against the battlements of the home. What is a 
home? It is not marble or brick or wood or straw; 
where the mother is there is the home. Ishmael in the 
wilderness of Beersheba, with no couch but Hagar's 
tresses, no canopy but Hagar's tears, was in a home. 
And as God answered Ishmael's cry and soothed the 
stricken soul of Hagar, so He speaks through Wood- 

67 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



craft to desolate homes today comforting the widowed 
and the fatherless. As the mother and the child turned 
in that far-off time to the well God opened in the sands, 
so the widow and the orphan turn today to the Wood- 
man certificate from wildernesses of grief and death. 
The woman and the child compose the basic group of 
history and society. They typify the reproductive ele- 
ment, the element that in nature is the object of a 
co-operation involving all the forces of the universe. 
They constitute the home, the point at which mankind 
obtains regeneration. The love of the mother for the 
child transformed the savage into the civilian, the cave 
into the palace, the family into the state. The care of 
the mother for the child was the beginning of all 
progress, the initial point of civilization. Practically 
all industry is traceable to this love and care. The 
complex industrial life of modern times with its gi- 
gantic machinery, its myriads of iron arms and hands, 
its millions of laborers, its billions of capital finds 
there its origin. It was the woman who in primal 
eras carried on her back for the nourishment of her 
young the game her lord had slaughtered. She thus 
provided the earliest mode of transportation ; today the 
railroad and the steamship discharge this function. 
She plowed with a stick and reaped with a knife; to- 
day the machines of the harvest field are among our 
modern wonders. She tamed and gathered the first 
cattle ; today vast ranches teem with multiplying herds. 
She wove the grasses and the bark ; today steel fingers 
make the clothing of the world. She fashioned shel- 
ters out of boughs; today great edifices of stone and 
iron mount the skies. She crushed the grain with 
heavy rocks; today huge roller mills perform this la- 
bor. She drew crude characters on the cliffs and sands, 
whispered a primeval prayer; today universities and 

68 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



churches rise. All in our civilization that is perma- 
nent and pure, all that induces peace and faith and 
hope, all that preserves material and moral happiness 
may be traced to the exhaustless fountain of a woman's 
sacrifice, a woman's love. 

Today that love endures, the holiest of human in- 
fluences, the shield of the modern as well as the an- 
cient home. Of all human spectacles I believe the 
noblest is that of a mother praying among her sleeping 
children. 

"At this hushed hour when all my children sleep, 
Here in Thy presence, gracious God, I kneel; 

And while the tears of gratitude I weep, 
Would pour the prayer which gratitude must feel. 

Eternal God! Oh, set Thy holy seal 
On these soft hearts which Thou to me hast sent; 

Repel temptation, guard their better weal; 
Be Thy pure spirit to their frailty lent, 
And lead them in the path their infant Savior went. 

I ask not for them eminence or wealth, 
For these in wisdom's view are trifling toys; 

But occupation, competence and health, 
Thy love, Thy presence and the lasting joys 
That flow therefrom; the passions which employ 

The breasts of holy men; and thus to be 
From all that taints or darkens or destroys 

The strength of principle, forever free; 

This is the better boon, O God, I ask of Thee." 

A few years ago on the prairies of the west two 
men driven to desperation by long careers of crime 
rode up to an humble cabin home determined to rob 
and burn and slay. As they entered the half-open 
door with rifles drawn they were transfixed by the 
vision of a young mother teaching a child of tender 
years and golden curls to pray. They heard her 
gently say: 

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The Gospel of Woodcraft 



"God's out here upon the prairie 
And He'll always mind His sheep; 
Then the baby voice lisped sweetly, 
'Now I lay me down to sleep.' " 

It is needless to say the rifles never spoke. With 
tear-dimmed eyes and drooping heads the paladins of 
the saddle rode away, rode like the wind, but not so fast 
as on the wings of memory their thoughts swept back 
to childhood and each heard again his own mother 
say: "Now I lay me down to sleep." I tell you, 
my friends, the sweetest harmony the harps and hearts 
of men have ever known is the memory of a mother's 
prayer. It lifts the soul as when 

"Lost in a gay and festal throng 
We tremble at some tender song — 
Set to an air whose golden bars 
We must have heard in other stars." 

The chief title of the Woodmen of the World to 
the loving allegiance of all humanity is its devotion to 
the mother and the home. Young ladies, if a young 
man aspiring to share his destiny with yours tells you 
in rapturous accents that your name is written on his 
heart tell him to write it on a Woodman certificate 
and you are his for all eternity. 

Thus we see that the preservation of the home is 
the mightiest service civilization may receive. It is a 
fact no longer open to question that one of the most 
effective methods of preserving the homes of the 
masses is through the properly managed insurance 
order. When the supporting arm is stricken the fire- 
side is imperiled. Through the Woodmen of the World 
and Woodmen Circle policies the children are kept 
about the altars of the home and the family circle 
remains unbroken. Thus a social unit is kept intact 

70 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



and humanity distinctly benefited. There is no event 
involving more tragic possibilities than the premature 
dissolution of the home. By far the larger number of 
American homes are dependent on the provider's daily 
toil. The insurance of the commercial companies with 
armies of agents, enormous salaries and high-priced 
propositions is for the most part beyond the reach 
of the man who sustains an humble home. This 
man typifies the majority of American home-builders, 
that great majority which is rapidly finding its way 
into the Woodmen of the World. The Woodmen of 
the World, framed on a co-operative, self-governing 
and entirely representative basis, enabled thereby to 
provide insurance at as near the actual cost as practic- 
able, contributes to society its principal bulwark, its 
surest defence. No other order combines business 
with brotherhood, fraternity with figures more suc- 
cessfully. We may not be skilled in the intricacies of 
actuarial science. We may know as little of the ab- 
stract principles of insurance as a certain man from a 
remote section of the country is reported to have 
known about the first Chautauqua he ever visited. Ac- 
cording to report this man was on his way to a town 
near which a Chautauqua was being held. Entering 
the Chautauqua grounds he discovered near the speak- 
ers' pavilion a merry-go-round in noisy operation and 
rode the latter to his heart's content. Returning home 
that night his wife asked: "John, did you see the 
Chautauqua?" "Sure," he replied, "I rode on the thing 
nine times." Every Woodman knows, however, that 
when we pay every death loss promptly and lay aside 
over a million dollars in surplus every year our rates 
cannot be far from accurate. In ritualistic portrayal of 
love, of honor and of remembrance, in ceremonial and 
practical illustration of fraternity, in mathematical 

71 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



soundness and security Woodcraft is supreme. Wood- 
craft means cash for the living and honor for the 
dead. It is one of the most powerful protectors of 
the American home, one of the most effective conserva- 
tors of social unity and progress. Second only to the 
church of God the true Woodman places Woodcraft. 
He has the assurance of divinity that "pure religion 
and undefiled before God and the Father is this, to visit 
the fatherless and the widows in their affliction and to 
keep himself unspotted from the world." 

I now desire to direct your attention to one of the 
best features of the Woodmen of the World. When 
a member reaches the age of 70 he is permitted to draw 
the full amount of his policy in ten equal annual 
installments. Thus Woodcraft brightens the path of 
age and teaches an inspiring lesson to all mankind, 
the lesson of devotion to the old. Cicero, a prominent 
example of the accomplishments of age, says in his 
treatise on this very subject that as a rule young men 
overthrow kingdoms while old men restore and sup- 
port them. He quotes an interesting dialogue between 
the aged Fabius, who baffled the youthful Hannibal, 
and a younger general regarding the city of Tarentum, 
which the latter had lost, but in the recovery of which 
by Fabius he had taken some part. "It was owing to 
my exertions, Quintus Fabius," said the younger gen- 
eral, "that you recovered Tarentum." "Unquestion- 
ably," replied Fabius, "for unless you had lost it I 
would never have had the opportunity to retake it." It 
is said that frequently the features of the old grow 
young in death. Only a few months ago I heard of the 
death of an aged mother. Pain unspeakable had torn 
her trembling frame. Her face portrayed an ashen 
agony. She suffered tortures that could not be painted 
or described. In the moment of death the racked and 

72 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



quivering form relaxed, the face grew strangely 
smooth and beautiful, the marks and signs of suf- 
ering had fled — only health and youth and strength 
were pictured in the silent features. Young men 
and women, respect and love the old in every station 
and degree of life. Their souls are as young as 
yours. When stripped of fleshly trappings they shall 
stand within the gates eternal all traces of decay and 
age will fly. 

In view of its many attractive characteristics it is 
not surprising that Woodcraft should have won an 
instant popularity with the American people. The 
world has never known a more perfect human sym- 
bol of equality than the Woodmen monument. The 
cross of Christ stands ever first as the purest mark 
of brotherhood. It emanated from a heart divine, a 
mind omnipotent. It signalized the dignity of every 
human life without regard to earthly state. The Wood- 
men monument, the conception of a mortal brain which 
by that thought became immortal, the brain of Joseph 
Cullen Root, rises at the grave of every member of 
the order regardless of worldly rank. The Woodmen 
monument proclaims that love of home and family as 
evidenced by a Woodman's foresight is glory's crown 
of glory. The Woodmen monument announces that 
the man who slumbers in its loving shadow has filled 
the highest measure of brotherhood and duty. It is an 
ideal emblem of fraternity, a distinction within the 
grasp of every man who loves his home, his family and 
his fellow-man. As we gather about a Woodman mon- 
ument we rejoice that Woodcraft has demonstrated 
that the highest honor this side of judgment is an honor 
in which all men may share. What position a departed 
sovereign held in earth's vainglorious eye we do not 
ask. We do not ask if wealth dropped down in silver 

73 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



showers on his path, if political or social eminence 
attended him. Our brother who sleeps beneath the 
Woodmen monument may have never towered in the 
councils of the wise or confronted problems involving 
a nation's destiny. But what Gladstone, what Webster, 
what Calhoun, what Talleyrand, what Clay ever cham- 
pioned a nobler measure than the preservation of a 
home. Our dead associate may have never charmed 
humanity with the sorcery of song. 

But what Shakespeare, what Milton, what Shelley, 
what Byron or what Burns ever hymned a grander 
melody than the laughter of a child secure from pov- 
erty and want? Our comrade now in ashes may have 
never swept the multitude with sentences of flame. 
But what Patrick Henry, what Richard Lee, what 
Burke, what Mirabeau, what Sumner ever voiced a 
purer sentiment than a sovereign's devotion to his fire- 
side? 

Our friend now lifeless may have never made the 
canvass or the marble seem to live and think and move 
and speak. But what Raphael, what Angelo, what 
Meissonier, what Titian or what Phidias ever fash- 
ioned with the chisel or the brush a more appealing 
scene than that of a mother and a babe sheltered from 
the storms and snows? Our sovereign who is at rest 
may have never shattered a thousand fortunes to 
upbuild his own or captained the industrial armies 
of his time. But what Vanderbilt, what Harriman, 
what Rockefeller, what Gould, what Rothschild ever 
conceived a financial enterprise more practical and 
more humane than provision for dependent ones 
against the sad emergency of the provider's death? 
O, tongue of history, salute the mighty names that 
blazon every age and page, but know that the Wood- 
men monument commemorates the modest dust of one 

74 



The Gospel of Woodcraft 



who became statesman, poet, orator, artist, financier, 
all these in holiest degree when with a Woodmen of 
the World certificate he made a paradise of his fireside, 
a heaven of his home. 



^ 



75 



UNVEILING ORATION AT GRAVES OF 
CRANFORD, PUTNAM, ROBERT- 
SON AND OTHERS. 

ONCE more the living meet to consecrate the 
memory of the dead. Once more we gather 
about the dust that has returned to dust, the 
ashes that with ashes have commingled. Once more 
we pause to contemplate the mystery that deepens 
with the sweep of ages. Once more we fling to heaven 
the questions of existence that have risen on an ever- 
swelling tide of tears since fate and time first taught 
the infant lips of history to lisp the changing fortunes 
of humanity. Once more we stand beside the invisible 
sea in which the stream of every life is lost. 

Once more the soul is torn with pain so hopeless 
and so terrible that it would seem as if some over- 
whelming blow of God unknown in all the histories, 
traditions, dreams and prophecies of man had without 
warning wrought unbounded woe. And yet what cir- 
cumstance is more inevitable than death, what object 
more familiar than the grave? We are taught from 
infancy that we must die. In every phase and stage of 
life we see as on some battlefield the havoc of the 
tomb. Every moment that has flown into the azure 
of the things that were has witnessed the flight of 
millions of mortal lives. 

Let us briefly review the burial ground of the 
past. On its furthest boundaries, beyond which in 
the twilight as yet unpenetrated by the historian and 
but dimly illuminated by the geologist, sleep the pris- 
tine races who through a hundred thousand years of 
struggle developed intelligence from instinct, society 
from savagery, the state from the family, and the city 

76 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

from the cave, repose the first generations known in 
human annals. There they rest, having begun the tire- 
less and everlasting ascent toward higher and better 
conditions which will not end till God shall bid the 
brain and soul and arm of man to think, aspire and 
strike no more. There they rest, the Pharaohs sur- 
rounded by their countless subjects who founded the 
most brilliant civilization of remote antiquity, Sarda- 
napalus with the masses of the three Assyrian empires, 
the descendants of Abraham with their prophets, 
judges, priests and kings, Darius with his armies and 
his Persian hordes, Homer with the demi-gods and 
heroes of the Trojan war, the rulers, sculptors, drama- 
tists, lawgivers, gods, philosophers, warriors, orators 
and citizens of independent Greece and republican 
Rome. Next lies Alexander with the phalanxes he 
led, the multitudes he conquered, then the consuls, 
emperors and hosts of later Rome, then the Vandals, 
Goths and Franks and all the barbarous swarms that 
terrorized the world, then the leaders and the peo- 
ples who began to shape the political divisions and 
institutions of modern times, the nobles, barons, lords, 
the vassals, serfs and popes, the knights of the great 
crusades and the innumerable thousands who fell 
beneath the opposing banners of the crescent and 
the cross, then the sovereigns who constructed king- 
doms on the ruins of feudalism, the writers, poets, 
explorers and commanders who made the ages in 
which these kingdoms reached the zenith glitter in 
the records of human thought and action, then the 
valorous figures of the revolutions that established 
popular liberty, and then the unnumbered throngs of 
the century from which we have recently emerged. 
As we have entered the current year we have seen the 
legions of the dead multiply with ever-increasing rapid- 

77 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

ity. We have hurriedly reviewed but the smallest por- 
tion of the necropolis of time. Think of the infinite 
billions who have died since the genesis of earth of 
whom no history speaks, no legend sings! This very 
hour views the departure of souls whose numbers only 
omnipotence can conceive. Turning from the cata- 
combs of the past we find the future an endless succes- 
sion of waiting graves. 

Thus death is the most familiar fact of mortal his- 
tory and experience. And yet its momentary recur- 
rence for hundreds of centuries has failed to teach us 
to accept it with serenity. The grief of the living for 
the dead is as intense today as it was two thousand 
years ago when a voice was heard in Rama, the voice 
of Rachel weeping for her children because they were 
not. The fountain of sorrow breaks forth afresh with 
every conquest of the crypt. The heart cannot be- 
come accustomed to the ravages of its invincible foe 
and frequently it bursts beyond all power to restore. 
And the distress for the loss of others is not more abso- 
lute than the fear with which we view our own demise. 
This attitude both as to ourselves and others is a re- 
flection on the intelligence of man and the justice of 
God. It cannot be that an event which God has made 
inevitable is a just source of misery and mourning. 

And yet how universal is the dread of death! So 
delightful are the sensations of physical existence, so 
abhorrent the idea of plunging into a world of shadow 
even to those whose lives are burdened and broken 
with disease, so deeply implanted in the human nature 
are love of earth and the horror of the grave, so diffi- 
cult is it for the mind to appreciate the permanence 
of the spirit that it is doubtful whether we shall ever 
cease to shrink from dissolution. 

But it is well that we should make some effort to 

78 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

grasp the meaning and the message of the tomb. Here 
the most useful aid, from the viewpoint of humanity, 
lies not so much in the musings, fancies and specula- 
tions of men as in what they said and did when con- 
fronted by immediate death. Perhaps the most 
unique example of disregard for death and confidence 
in the perpetuity of the spirit may be found in the 
speech of Socrates before the judges who had sentenced 
him to die. In the delivery of eternal truths he 
towered into the mould and outline of a god. Stand- 
ing before a tribunal which he knew was powerless to 
injure the essential portion of his nature, rising out of 
time and place above the Athenian multitudes who 
could not understand the sublimity of his position, he 
became the most colossal figure of pagan history. He 
disdained to plead for mortal life because he knew that 
death meant not destruction, but liberation. This 
knowledge enabled him to address his executioners 
with calmness almost superhuman, and it would} 
equally have enabled him to defy alone the concen- 
trated armies of the earth. Indeed, he seemed to care 
more for the welfare of those who had condemned him 
than for himself. He felt that the grave was but an 
incident in the development of the soul, a stage where- 
in the spirit broke the chains of physical imperfection. 
Four hundred years after this immortal pagan died 
Christ came to give these principles the impress and 
the sanction of divinity. And since Christ gave the 
world the spectacle of a God in the agony of death and 
the glory of resurrection men have tranquilly endured 
the most hideous forms of persecution and torture. 

History contains no stranger and no sublimer scene 
than the death of Thomas Cranmer. Adorned with 
the finest qualities of education and culture he pros- 
tituted his abilities to win the favor and preferment 

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At the Graves of Cranf ord and Others 

of the crown. It was with his assistance that Henry 
VIII. expelled from England's throne the unhappy 
Catharine of Aragon, and for this the most exalted 
honors were showered on his brow. Solemnly com- 
mitted to the succession provided by the will of Henry 
VIII. he conspired to divert the scepter to another 
line. But the project failed, and although he forswore 
the faith of his life in an effort to escape the fagot he 
was doomed to die. It was then that Cranmer rose to 
glory. In the shadows of the stake he caught the 
significance of death and firmness succeeded vacilla- 
tion, courage, cowardice. He knew that from the 
ashes of the body the soul would sweep like a 
liberated eagle to the sky. He knew that life in 
the highest sense was not to end, but only to begin, 
that the stake was his cradle, not his grave. Re- 
avowing without hesitation his original beliefs, he 
denounced his former crimes and sins and exhorted the 
people to obedience and righteousness. The hand that 
had written the renunciation he promptly thrust into 
the rising flame in order that it might be first de- 
stroyed. Death made Cranner great and the fires 
that consumed him have thrown an eternal radiance 
around his memory. 

One of the grandest pictures in the gallery of time 
is Richard Rumbold on the scaffold at Market Cross in 
Edinburgh where he was hanged and drawn and 
quartered for complicity in the Monmouth rebellion of 
1685. Expressing assurance in the future of the spirit 
the aged martyr died. His life and love had been 
devoted to the cause of freedom. He had followed 
Cromwell in the strife for popular rights. He had 
stood with that great leader in his memorable bat- 
tles for humanity. He was a worthy successor of 
William Wallace and Robert Bruce, a forerunner of 

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At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

Sam Davis and Nathan Hale. There is no nobler 
death than his in all the heroic ages of the world. In 
his address from the gallows he pronounced a sentence 
that expresses the spirit of modern freedom and prog- 
ress — a sentence that history has trumpeted to eter- 
nity. "No man," he cried, "comes into the world with 
a saddle on his back, neither any booted and spurred 
to ride him." This sentence comprises the philosophy 
of liberty and fraternity. It is at once the briefest 
and most eloquent expression of the idea on which 
fraternal organizations like the Woodmen of the World 
are based. Sir Henry Vane, Servetus, Sidney, Ra- 
leigh, Thomas Harrison and the others to whom the 
grave became a crystal blazoned with the reflected 
glories of a better land have equally exemplified the 
loftiest conceptions of death. And many in the usual 
careers of life have fearlessly saluted the engulfing 
shades. 

The most remarkable and instructive of these in- 
stances is that of Socrates, who, without the nature or 
the precedent of divinity, four hundred years before 
Calvary, through a system of reasoning that was en- 
tirely human, showed pagan man the stars that broke 
the darkness of the tomb. And it is as marvelous as it 
is sad that nineteen hundred years after the meditations 
of a pagan have been confirmed by the teachings and 
the deeds of Christ— after these deeds and teachings 
have been proclaimed from pulpit, cathedral, street 
and temple, after the followers of Christ have re- 
peatedly demonstrated in their own experiences the 
fact of an existence which death cannot destroy, after 
all the lessons and warnings of the past, most men and 
women still regard with indifference the questions of 
the sepulcher. 

But, eliminating for the moment the arbitrary ele- 

81 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

ment of divine precept and law, what do the examples 
quoted really signify? What practical evidence do 
they offer on the question of existence after death? 
Can they be more than bases for inference and suppo- 
sition? Have not criminals of the most brutal type 
met death with equal courage and similar professions 
of faith in God and immortality? Have not atheists 
died with perfect firmness and serenity ? Is it possible 
to show from mere human argument that the tomb is 
not life's final boundary ? I think it is. 

When Socrates in his Athenian prison drank the 
hemlock he rose unseen by those who thought him 
dead and in the viewless garb of the ideas that fruited 
from his brain he speaks through his philosophy to 
the endless ages. His individuality is more pronounced 
and powerful now than on that day in Athens when 
what was physical in him perished and wherever 
learning has reared its classic groves since then his 
influence has remained a living and uplifting force. 

When Cicero, the solitary pillar of an expiring re- 
public, was murdered at his Formian villa he returned 
to the Roman senate clad in an invisible toga and from 
the ruins of that historic capitol his oratory still charms 
and elevates the world. Although the denunciations 
of Catiline and the philippics against Antony failed to 
save the ancient republic still through his domination 
in succeeding times of the literature of freedom and 
patriotic eloquence which has ever found in him its 
archetype and inspiration he has tremendously ad- 
vanced the liberties of mankind. His influence became 
infinitely more potent when assassination released him 
from the Rome of Antony and Augustus and trans- 
lated him to eternity. 

When Rome herself was stripped of imperial form 
and political identity she lost only what was tempo- 

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At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

rary and through the ascendancy of her laws and cus- 
toms in modern governments and societies she still 
"sits upon her seven hills and from her throne of 
beauty rules the world !" 

When Napoleon was laid beneath the willows of 
Helena he began a world-existence more glorious than 
his mortal career. A Jove in the Olympus of arms 
he will help to plan the battles of all time. His figure 
will grow larger in the perspective of the ages and 
each period will renew the story of his deeds. In 
every generation he will win another Austerlitz, as- 
cend another Alps and cross another bridge of Lodi. 

When the great heart of Washington ceased its 
pulsings at Mount Vernon his influence upon the des- 
tinies of man became infinitely enlarged. The admo- 
nitions of his celebrated farewell address have guided 
the policies of the government for a hundred years 
and his personality is powerful today in all the affairs 
of state. From his tomb by the Potomac he tenderly 
observes the growth of the republic, the child of his 
sword, and there he will continue to receive the love 
of the multiplying millions whose liberties he secured. 

And Robert Lee — history's most splendid combina- 
tion of military and moral greatness — an Alexander 
without arrogance, a Caesar without assassins, a Na- 
poleon without tyranny — death did not take him from 
the south. His example of serenity in defeat and 
loyalty to a despairing land will gather beauty from 
the centuries. His example forms the basis of southern 
hope and inspiration. He sits by every southern fire- 
side to counsel love of home and country ; he stands in 
every southern hall of state to prompt the noblest im- 
pulses of patriotism, the profoundest measures for the 
common good. 

It cannot be said that this survival of intellectual 
83 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

and moral influence is the mere fame of history, the 
transitory subject of legend and tradition. For if the 
achievements of Socrates and Cicero and Washington 
and Lee had remained unchronicled and unsung, if 
their names had been long ago forgotten, their influ- 
ences still would sway mankind. Indeed, their names 
and memories may yet fade; history itself, like some 
tropical river, may be lost in eternity's desert sands. 
But the sum of all their deeds, impulses, thoughts, 
ambitions, principles and opinions constitute an iden- 
tity more distinct, an existence more complete and last- 
ing than when they were confined within the limita- 
tions of a human frame. And this is equally true of 
every individual. All that we do and say becomes a 
part of the general heritage of posterity. The grave 
for all of us is but the beginning of the truest and the 
highest life. And the man or woman in the humblest 
sphere may through the influence of some sacrifice 
or thought or deed begin an existence after death as 
beneficent and beautiful as that of him who has the 
applause of men. 

In recognition of the fact that in the life of every 
man, however poor, however humble, are immortal ele- 
ments, the Woodmen of the World erects a monument 
at the graves of all its dead. This order thus ex- 
presses one of the most important facts of human 
life. It has thus obtained and illustrated the essence 
of fraternity. It thus appeals with force unusual to the 
intelligence and the affection of mankind. And in this 
feature may be found one of the principal causes of 
its remarkable growth. It is the torch-bearer of fra- 
ternal progress. 

The Woodmen of the World is powerfully equipped 
for the great mission of fraternity, the protection of 
the home. What grander task could occupy human- 

84 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

ity? A wanderer in a distant land who felt the lone- 
liness and pain which only those without a home can 
know embalmed in deathless melody a sentiment as 
true as ever dwelt in human heart or rose on mortal 
lip. "Home, sweet home," he cried and immortality 
echoed the refrain. I know that Apollo swept such 
harmony from the lyre that the listening gods were 
charmed and the world acclaimed him deity of song. 
I know that Orpheus with magic strain led rocks and 
trees and beasts to follow him and so enthralled the 
underworld that angels gazed thereon with envy. I 
know that Timotheus with wondrous harmony sub- 
dued the riotous Alexander, awoke at will within his 
haughty soul emotions high as heaven and instincts 
low as hell, and with a skillful change of chord dis- 
placed upon the monarch's lips a sigh of pity with a 
curse of hate. I know that David drew from his en- 
trancing harp a concord that dispelled the gloom about 
the brow of Saul and flooded Israel's palaces with the 
laughter of music and the joy of song. I know that 
when Cecilia sang seraphs were fascinated and men en- 
raptured. I know that Eleanor's troubadours at Anti- 
och bewitched the Syrian air with the ballads of the 
south and lightened the horrors of the second crusade. 
[ know that the compositions of Palestrina, Handel, 
Mozart, Beethoven and the rest have elevated man 
with symphonies sublime. But I know that all of 
these combined by a master greater than those who 
as yet have lived into one gorgeous rhapsody can 
equal not the pathos and the majesty of "Home, 
Sweet Home." It contains a sentiment that appeals 
to men regardless of environment and destiny. It 
leads them to forget the barriers of tradition, race 
and birth, and with this song upon their lips all men 
are brothers in the universal fraternity of God. It is 

85 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

fraternity's battle-hymn, and it will be the permanent 
password when all earth's children shall have become 
a common brotherhood. When the universe shall 
resound with the notes that trumpet earth to judg- 
ment, this song, fraternity's purest expression, Wood- 
craft's most beautiful illustration, will burst from the 
translated living and the awakened dead as the most 
fitting tribute of mortality to God. 

We have met today to unveil the monuments at 
the graves of Sovereigns Mrs. Sallie N. Lanier, James 
Madison Tapp, P. L. Babb, J. A. B. Putnam, W. L. 
Robertson, John Walter Cranford and F. J. McClendon. 

Sovereign Mrs. Sallie N. Lanier was a member of 
the Woodmen Circle, the ladies' auxiliary of the Wood- 
men of the World. The success of this organization 
is an evidence of the fact that woman is the equal of 
man in the fraternal insurance field as well as every 
other department of social activity. Perhaps the most 
striking feature of recent times has been the demon- 
stration of the capability of woman to meet with 
marked success the duties and requirements of every 
phase of human effort. Mrs. Lanier was born in Pon- 
totoc county, Mississippi, in 1849. She came to Texas 
in 1859. She was married to W. A. Lanier in 1870 
and seven children crowned the happy union. She 
was a faithful member of the local Grove for ten years. 
She was one of the principal factors in its progress. 
In upholding the doctrine of fraternity she contributed 
to the advancement of the country. She was a light 
in the community, a model at the fireside. Her life 
exemplified the ideals of American womanhood. 

Sovereign James Madison Tapp was born in Laud- 
erdale county, Alabama, in 1833. At an early age he 
became a devoted Christian and his long and honor- 
able life reflected the beauty of the Christian faith. 

86 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

He died at Sulphur Springs in 1892 carrying to the 
tomb the priceless jewel of a spotless name. He was 
a useful and progressive citizen whose influence il- 
luminated alike the community, the church, the home. 
He was universally and justly beloved. He be- 
queathed to earth a large and consecrated family who 
have reproduced his shining virtues. Such men are 
blessings from the throne and heart of God. 

Sovereign P. L. Babb was born in 1857 at Mount 
Pleasant, in Titus county, Texas. A few years later 
he came with his parents to Franklin county, near 
Winnsboro, where he remained during his boyhood. 
There he was married in 1882. He removed with his 
family to Sulphur Springs in 1894. Here he became 
a Woodman in 1896 and here at his home on College 
street, in November, 1900, he died. He was a true and 
a courageous Woodman. His love for his family found 
example in a Woodmen certificate which, through 
his own prudence and the beneficence of the Wood- 
men of the World, will, like a gleaming buckler, pro- 
tect them from poverty and want. He adorned the 
manifold relations of life, winning the respect of the 
world, the approval of his friends and the adoration of 
his family. 

Sovereign J. A. B. Putnam was born at Jackson- 
ville, Illinois, in December, 1839. He was descended 
from a noted ancestry, his great-grandfather, General 
Veeder, of New York, having been prominent in the 
revolutionary war. His early youth was marked by 
constant study and rapid progress. He graduated with 
high honor from the University of Iowa in 1859. In 
the same year his father removed the family to Texas 
and settled in Hopkins county. Here he remained un- 
til his death in 1895. For thirty-six years Sovereign 
Putnam was a conspicuous element in the growth of 

87 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

Hopkins county. Shortly after reaching Texas the 
death of his father made him the head and hope of 
the family. He enlisted in the confederate army in 
the spring of 1862 and served with credit through- 
out the war as lieutenant in Captain L. D. King's 
company of Gould's regiment. At the close of the 
war he began the practice of law. He was a mem- 
ber of the twelfth Texas legislature. He occupied 
many positions of responsibility and importance, hav- 
ing been county judge of Hopkins county and judge 
of the eighth judicial district of Texas, declining re- 
election to the latter office, although it had been 
unanimously tendered him. He was an able, careful 
and conservative lawyer, a fearless, fair and incorrupt- 
ible judge, a valiant soldier, a patriotic citizen. 

Sovereign W. L. Robertson was a native of this 
lovely city. Beneath these skies his life-work was per- 
formed. Here he felt all the varying emotions of hu- 
manity, all the laughter and all the tears, all the hopes, 
joys, the ambitions and the woes. Here his prelimi- 
nary training was accomplished and here he began life's 
arduous struggle after the completion of his studies at 
the University of Virginia. For him it was barely 
three decades between "the cradle and the grave. When 
youth was mellowing into a royal manhood there came 
from unseen shores the clear, sad notes that called 
him to the narrow cathedral of the dust, death's vesper 
bells whose summons we cannot disobey. He trans- 
lated the principles of Woodcraft into his daily 
existence. No king, no emperor could have a prouder 
epitaph. 

John Walter Cranford was one of the most gifted 
men in the history of Texas. Fatherless and mother- 
less in his thirteenth year, he faced the world unaided 
and alone. Splendidly did he wage the war with des- 

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At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

tiny. With marvelous industry and perseverance, 
toiling on the farm for subsistence, refusing with pain- 
ful fortitude the sleep for which night's desolate hours 
clamored, attending school with the savings garnered 
out of years of labor, he acquired a classical education, 
obtained admission to the bar and rose to the highest 
positions within the bestowal of the people. He was 
a senator in the twenty-first and twenty-second leg- 
islatures of Texas, having been chosen president pro 
tempore of the senate in the latter. He was one of the 
youngest men to hold so exalted a station. His 
service in the Texas senate was signalized by tireless 
energy and a broadening grasp of public affairs. He 
was the author of several beneficent measures which 
remain today upon the statutes of the state. In 1896 
he was elected to Congress by an admiring consti- 
tuency. He died before the expiration of his first 
term. It may be said without extravagance that he 
was one of the most effective and fascinating orators 
the south has yet produced. He possessed in a rare 
and perhaps unequalled degree the quality of cloth- 
ing the most prosaic facts with entrancing sentiment. 
Through all these nobler attributes shone a remark- 
able good nature, a generous spirit which was imme- 
diately responsive to the appeals of friendship and 
misfortune. As statesman, orator, lawyer, patriot, he 
has earned the gratitude of his people. 

Sovereign F. J. McClendon was born in Louisiana 
in 1840. He removed to Texas in 1878 and died in 
September, 1897. He followed the stars and bars 
from 1861 to 1865. He was wounded at Chickamauga. 
He was a private soldier in that titanic strife and for 
this deserves especial honor from mankind. A gen- 
eral's name is shouted to the world. The adulation of 
history and the multitude repay him for the priva- 

89 



At the Graves of Cranford and Others 

tions of war. But no like requital nerves the arm, no 
similar ambition thrills with its wild music the heart 
of the common soldier. His identity is lost in that of 
the army. The renown he achieves is enjoyed by his 
superior in command. He must obey the most unrea- 
sonable orders without question, marching sometimes 
into the throat of hell without warning. If he lives he 
is unnoticed; if he dies he is forgotten. Obscurity is 
his unmerited destiny. His name is rarely heralded 
from the heights of fame. As a private soldier the 
memory of Sovereign McClendon should receive the 
ever-deepening love and reverence of this community. 

These Sovereigns are not dead. They have entered 
the higher life. The thoughts, the dreams, the aspi- 
rations, the deeds of charity and the words of love 
compose an identity which the flesh no longer prisons 
and which the grave cannot destroy. How indestruct- 
ible is man ! The immortality of his thoughts and deeds 
and hopes is as provable from human reason and ex- 
perience as is the immortality of his soul from divine 
example and ordainment. 

These immortalities, my friends, will blend and 
burst into a joyous life with God when earth and time 
and history shall cease. In Job we read that the day 
of death is better than the day of birth and in Matthew 
we find it said that God is not the God of the dead. 
If God be not the God of the dead there are no dead, 
for that of which He is not God cannot exist. Then 
let the heart no longer ache, the lips no longer sob, 
the tears no longer flow. For somewhere in the mys- 
tic reach beyond the furthest limits of the future where 
canopies of fadeless light o'erarch the enraptured hosts 
of glory, all nations, races, families and generations 
will meet in everlasting life and love. 



90 



THE WOODMEN OF THE WORLD. 

THERE is something holy in a gathering of the 
people to celebrate the progress of a great, hu- 
manitarian movement. The very air seems 
magnetized with sympathy both human and divine. 
The collective voice, the collective judgment, the col- 
lective action of the people have an operation and a 
significance of almost supernatural scope. The peo- 
ple as a whole possess a wisdom not of earth and the 
spirit of God moves in their aspirations and ambitions 
dwelling over the multitudes as over the infinite waters. 
Faith in the triumph of justice, in the permanence of 
truth, in the survival of right, in the chastisement of 
all oppression and of all wrong rests on faith in the 
purity and integrity of the masses. 

The lessons of all literature and the teachings of 
all history unite in proof and vindication of such faith. 
However sinister the characters of individuals, how- 
ever corrupt and tyrannous the few, in the hearts of 
the common people have ever throbbed the impulses 
of justice and of truth. The development of every 
beneficent institution has been but the realization of 
the fundamental tendencies of the popular heart. If 
unlimited despotisms have perished it has been due to 
the fact that against them the masses have revolted. 
Against injustice in every form the people have in- 
stinctively protested. Conditions of primitive poverty 
and the lack of education and information may have 
for a time repressed the popular demand for the cor- 
rection and removal of evils but the final awakening 
of the people has been translated in the establish- 
ment of enlightened civilization, representative gov- 
ernment and individual freedom. And whenever the 

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The Woodmen of the World 



people assemble in the name of a cause which reflects 
their achievements and ambitions the instincts and 
principles that have animated the struggles of thirty 
centuries transfigure the occasion with an enthusiasm 
that leaps from every lip and eye and thrills in every 
hand-clasp. 

With especial enthusiasm should we enter into the 
spirit of the present occasion. We have met under the 
standards of an organization whose purposes are pro- 
motive of the popular welfare in the fullest and most 
elevating sense. Among all the enterprises of the pres- 
ent and the past for the improvement of material con- 
ditions the people have engaged in none more fruitful 
of benefit than that of fraternal insurance. And no 
organization more successfully embodies the principles 
or more effectively reflects the progress of fraternal 
insurance than the Woodmen of the World, a people's 
organization providing essentially a people's insurance. 
The Woodmen of the World is growing so rapidly that 
it tasks the eye to mark its onward sweep. It is multi- 
plying and replenishing the fraternal world. Nothing 
like it has ever been seen and it can hardly be seen on 
account of the rapidity with which it moves. The 
only things that indicate its passage to an astonished 
world are the yells of the candidate and the bleatings 
of the goat. It makes an Ormond Beach automobile 
look like an East Texas ox wagon. The Woodmen are 
everywhere; there is not an air beneath the flag they 
do not breathe, not a landscape in which their axes 
do not glitter. They are in every state of the Ameri- 
can Union, on the Atlantic's shore, the Pacific's strand, 
they are where the blue of the great lakes commingles 
with the blue of the heavens; they are on the Gulf's 
historic coast. Some are in Congress, but not one of 
the latter is yet in jail. On leaving Washington at 

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The Woodmen of the World 



the close of the recent session of Congress I noticed in 
the car a Woodman and a member of a rival order on 
the seat just ahead of mine. The member of the rival 
order seemed to be restless and morose. Prompted 
by the fraternal sympathy which bubbles in the heart 
of every Woodman the sovereign said: "What's the 
matter, my friend? You seem to be in trouble." 
"Yes," he replied, "I am; to tell you the truth I am 
tired of seeing so many Woodmen of the World. I 
see them everywhere, every day, every hour. I am go- 
ing to Kentucky, from there to Arkansas, from there 
to Texas and from there to heaven or hell, I don't care 
which, if only I can get to a place where there are no 
Woodmen of the World." "My friend," the Woodman 
replied, "you needn't go to Kentucky, for you'll find 
15,000 Woodmen there. You needn't go to Arkansas, 
for you'll discover 25,000 Woodmen there. You needn't 
go to Texas, for 160,000 sovereigns are there, led by 
the invincible Fraser. You needn't go to heaven, for 
the disembodied spirits of thousands of departed Wood- 
men whose songs on high and whose monuments on 
earth proclaim the performance of duty to family and 
to God, led by the sainted Falkenburg, are there. But 
you can go to hell, for you'll find not a single Wood- 
man there to interrupt your progress." 

The Woodmen of the World is one of the leading 
fraternal organizations of the time. It is a brother- 
hood in the purest and most uplifting sense, a fraternity 
in the highest conception of the term. It has just con- 
cluded the twentieth year of its existence. Every year 
since its birth has witnessed an increasingly rapid 
growth. Organized, at Omaha, in the state of Ne- 
braska, in 1890, it has spread throughout the United 
States and entered Canada. A brief comparison with 
other orders will show how remarkable has been the 

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The Woodmen of the World 



advance of the Woodmen of the World. Prior to 
1890, the year of the beginning of the Woodmen of 
the World, there had been established in the United 
States about fifty fraternal insurance orders of import- 
ance. The Woodmen of the World has distanced all 
these older orders with the exception of one which was 
organized in 1883, seven years in advance of the Wood- 
men of the World. 

This one order, the only one now exceeding the 
Woodmen of the World in membership, is without 
an emergency fund and defies the plainest laws of mor- 
tality, the simplest principles of mathematics. In the 
ancient Greek games young men raced with lighted 
torches and the victory was not simply for him who 
ran the fastest but who ran fastest with his torch 
still ablaze. In the fraternal order race the emergency 
fund is the lighted torch. Continuing the comparison 
we find that during 1890 about nine other fraternal in- 
surance orders were organized, all of which have been 
outstripped by the Woodmen of the World, their com- 
bined membership not equaling that of the Woodmen 
of the World alone. Since 1890 over one hundred fra- 
ternal insurance orders proper have been inaugurated, 
all of which have been left far behind by the Wood- 
men of the World. It is all very well to say that this 
order or that order is as good as the Woodmen of the 
World, but when you go into details you will stumble 
and halt as did the individual who, according to Gen- 
eral Grosvenor, once visited the Mammoth Cave. At 
that time a hotel was running near the entrance to 
the cave called "The Poetry Hotel," and one of its 
rules was that all guests on leaving the hotel had to 
write a verse on the register underneath their respec- 
tive names giving their impressions of the cave. The 
man of whom we are speaking registered at the hotel 

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The Woodmen of the World 



without noticing the rule and when he was about to 
leave the landlord requested him to write the required 
verse. "But I can't write poetry," was the emphatic 
protest. "It makes no difference," replied the land- 
lord, "you can't leave until you write that verse." The 
bewildered guest seized the pen and began to scrawl: 

"The Mammoth Cave, Oh, what a hummer, 
Cold in winter, hot in summer. 
Great Jehovah, what a wonder — " 

Here he stopped. He could think of nothing else. 
But looking up he saw a pistol frowning upon him 
from the landlord's hand and he hastily added, 

"Andrew Jackson, hell and thunder." 

The Woodmen of the World is a typical fraternal 
insurance order and its chief purpose is the distribution 
of life insurance on the fraternal, self-governing plan. 
It is one of over two hundred similar societies which 
represent the fraternal system of life insurance in the 
United States. The fraternal system is to be distin- 
guished from the old line system, which is represented 
by more than a hundred companies, the majority of 
which are mutual in form and in form only, and the re- 
mainder stock corporations. Between the old line com- 
pany and the fraternal order, partaking of certain 
characteristics of both, but identical with neither, is the 
assessment association. The assessment associations 
have been without marked success as a system, al- 
though there are over 90 in existence today, because 
they have had neither the accumulations of the old 
liners nor the lodge system and representative govern- 
ment of the fraternals. The Armstrong insurance in- 
vestigating committee of the New York legislature has 
recommended that no more assessment associations be 

95 



The Woodmen of the World 



permitted to operate in the state of New York. The 
system represented by the assessment societies may 
hardly be considered a factor of importance in the in- 
surance situation. The field is divided mainly between 
the fraternal orders and the old line companies. It is 
difficult for the mind to grasp the immensity of modern 
life insurance in all its forms. It is safe to say that there 
are now over twenty billions of outstanding life insur- 
ance in the United States exclusive of industrial insur- 
ance, the insurance of children, which is itself an enor- 
mous business, and that over twelve million American 
citizens comprise the number of the insured. It is as if 
twelve million men had deposited in an immense sav- 
ings bank amounts individually small, but in the aggre- 
gate sufficiently large to produce under the insurance 
system a sum for the protection of their families and 
the preservation of their homes equivalent to one-fifth 
the total wealth of the United States, the richest na- 
tion on earth. In this fact lies the surest hope, the 
grandest promise of the continued happiness and pros- 
perity of the American people. These twelve million 
men have erected a bulwark of gold against the un- 
certainties of the future. They are doing more for this 
republic than all the congresses, courts and legislatures, 
all the governors, all the judges and all the presi- 
dents. They can read their titles clear to the grati- 
tude of posterity. 

Insurance in its various forms is the principal pillar 
of modern progress. It is the chief conserver of hu- 
man effort. It is perhaps the greatest material factor 
in the world's present development. It gives certainty 
and steadiness to all enterprise. It represents the su- 
preme endeavor of mankind to eliminate chance and 
to disarm misfortune. It is the Promethean flame, the 
Titan's ladder of modern aspiration. There was never 

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The Woodmen of the World 



a more mistaken notion than that which holds insur- 
ance to be essentially a gambling transaction. Strange- 
ly enough this idea once obtained to such an extent 
that insurance was denounced by law as a form of 
gambling. In point of fact insurance is the very op- 
posite of gambling. Its object is to reduce the element 
of chance to such a degree of certainty that its evil 
results may be absolutely neutralized. Applying the 
doctrines of averages and probabilities to all life and 
business it seeks to build a shield against every fea- 
ture of uncertainty in both. The man who has no in- 
surance is the real gambler. He bets that he will 
prosper and grow strong. He bets that disease will 
not lay its fatal finger on his brow. He bets that he 
will live sufficiently long to educate his children and 
provide a competency for those depending on him. 
Staking the happiness of his family on the issue he 
gambles with destiny and trifles with the loaded dice 
of death. If, on the other hand, he has insurance, he 
makes certain insofar as lies in human power the pro- 
tection of his family and his home. He eliminates to 
the extent of human foresight and prudence the un- 
known quantities in the treacherous equations of ex- 
istence. Insurance is man's chief weapon against the 
vagaries of fortune. Its results are certainties, not 
lotteries, certainties based on laws as fixed and change- 
less as all the other laws of nature and of God. It is 
certain that out of a given number of men, a number 
large enough to permit the operation of the law of 
averages, a definite and easily calculable number will 
die within a year. The sum which each must con- 
tribute to make possible the payment of a given 
amount to the families of those who die is equally 
calculable. It is evident that in each succeeding year 
larger numbers will die because death grows more 

97 



The Woodmen of the World 



probable with age and that larger death payments 
must be made. This increase is met either by charg- 
ing each man from the beginning such a sum as will 
pay for current deaths and by investment of the re- 
mainder at interest offset the increasing cost of in- 
creasing age or by charging a greater sum each year. 
The first method, known as the level premium or re- 
serve fund method, has been found most practicable 
and satisfactory and has become the basis of modern 
life insurance. These principles are applicable equally 
to old line companies and fraternal orders ; they repre- 
sent the unchangeable logic of unchangeable facts. The 
old line company or fraternal order which charges a 
fixed and unincreasing premium and does not provide 
a reserve or emergency fund to guard against increas- 
ing age will inevitably die. 

It is evident that life insurance is essentially co- 
operative, that it is an expression of brotherhood. It 
is brotherly love expressed in a mathematical formula 
and an economic movement. It is a distribution of 
the losses of the few among the many, a system 
whereby the burdens which would crush the indi- 
vidual are sustained by the community at large. It 
follows that the simplest and most natural form of 
life insurance is that of a voluntary, self-governing, 
organization conducted without ostentation or lav- 
ish expenditure and charging no more than is neces- 
sary to pay death losses with a small addition for 
unavoidable expense. This is the true insurance of the 
people, the fraternal embodiment of what is essentially 
a fraternal principle, the system typified in the fra- 
ternal insurance order. It follows further that when- 
ever men obtain control of an insurance organization 
for purposes of enrichment and aggrandizement, ad- 
ding high and extravagant charges in order to make 

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The Woodmen of the World 



enormous profits, they prostitute the system and de- 
grade the principle of pure life insurance. Recent reve- 
lations have shown that this has been the chief charac- 
teristic of certain old line companies. The discoveries 
of the Armstrong insurance investigating committee of 
the New York legislature were appalling. A quarrel 
over the spoils among the rulers of the Equitable led 
to disclosures which prompted the legislature of New 
York on July 20, 1905, to appoint a committee of inves- 
tigation. The committee was composed of three sen- 
ators, Armstrong, Tully and Riordan, and five assem- 
blymen, Rogers, Cox,Wemple, Prentice and McKeown. 
The principal attorney was Charles E. Hughes, who de- 
veloped notable inquisitorial powers and made an in- 
ternational reputation. The examination began on the 
6th of September, 1905, and was concluded on the 30th 
of the following December. It revealed a record of 
colossal theft, a record of pillage and corruption that 
dishonored our country before the world. 

The examination showed that the so-called mutual 
companies were autocracies in the most unqualified 
sense. It showed that according to the law of its crea- 
tion the New York Mutual, with 660,000 policyholders, 
with over a billion and a half dollars of insurance in 
force, with total assets of over 440 millions and a 
surplus of over 70 millions, was what its name implied 
a purely mutual organization intended to be governed 
exclusively by the policyholders, every policyholder 
with at least $1,000 of insurance being entitled to an 
equal vote, but that in reality the policyholders had 
practically no voice in the selection of trustees or in 
the management of the company. It showed that 
although there were between 400,000 and 500,000 
policyholders entitled to vote for trustees, neverthe- 
less for a long period of years not more than 200 votes 

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The Woodmen of the World 



had been cast at any election, the voters who had 
voted personally being generally employees of the 
company or of subsidiary companies; that the offi- 
cers practically named the trustees, who in turn elected 
the officers; that the board of trustees exercised no 
effective check on the management, the by-laws con- 
centrating practically all powers in the officers. The 
examination showed that the New York Life, with 
over 900,000 policyholders, with nearly two billion 
dollars of insurance in force, with total assets of 
over 390 millions and a surplus of over 47 millions, 
was mutual in name only, that although there were 
some 800,000 policyholders entitled to vote, the larg- 
est number of votes ever cast at an election was 2,328 
in 1905, the next largest 803 in 1904, the votes cast 
in person being usually those of employees; that as 
in the Mutual the officers dictated the election of trust- 
ees and the trustees elected the officers; in short, that 
the officers exercised an absolute and invincible control. 
The examination showed that in the Equitable, a stock 
company with over 560,000 policyholders, with over a 
billion and a half dollars of outstanding insurance, with 
total assets of over 400 millions and a surplus of 67 mil- 
lions, a stock company with a capital of $100,000, a 
majority of which, represented by 502 shares, belonged 
to one man, and the dividends on which were limited to 
7 per cent, annually, the surplus being reserved for the 
exclusive benefit of the policyholders, who, however, 
had no right to vote, the trustees were mere figure- 
heads; that the real powers were exercised by officers 
and committeemen whose administration had been 
marked by "excessive salaries, excessive commissions, 
excessive expenses and superfluous officers," and that 
although all accumulations had been supposedly re- 
served for the sole benefit of the policyholder, Mr. 

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The Woodmen of the World 



Hyde, the owner of the majority of the stock, the in- 
come on which was specifically limited to $3,500 per 
annum, was offered for it from one to seven million 
dollars and finally sold it to Thos. F. Ryan for two 
and one-half millions. These three companies occupied 
half the old line field, equaling in assets and business 
all other companies combined, and they had been prac- 
tically dominated by their presidents and probably a 
few other officers. In the language of the clown in the 
pantomine of "Humpty-Dumpty," some of the old line 
presidents may well exclaim: 

"I am the king, 
And the ace and the deuce and the jack; 
I am the high and the low, I'd have you know, 
In fact, I'm the whole durn pack." 

But what was the result of the exercise of such 
enormous power by these old line officers? The Arm- 
strong investigation disclosed that the officers of the 
Mutual held such autocratic power as to produce an 
extravagant disregard of the policyholders' interests; 
that salaries were increased enormously, the president's 
annual salary having been fixed at $30,000 in 1877, at 
$50,000 in 1880, at $75,000 in 1893, at $90,000 in 1895, 
at $100,000 in 1896, and at $150,000 in 1901 ; the first 
vice-president's salary having been increased from $20,- 
000 in 1877 to $50,000 in 1902; the second vice-presi- 
dent's from $7,200 in 1877 to $17,400 in 1899; a third 
vice-president having been added in 1902 at $30,000; 
the treasurer's salary having been increased from $14,- 
000 in 1885 to $40,000 in 1896; the general manager's 
from $20,000 in 1891 to $30,000 in 1902; that Robert H. 
McCurdy, the president's son, received over $530,000 
as his share of the profits of the Mutual's metropolitan 
agency and over a million and a quarter dollars in com- 

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The Woodmen of the World 



missions on foreign business, a portion of which he di- 
vided with his metropolitan agency partner ; that Louis 
A. Thebaud, the president's son-in-law, received over 
$930,000 as his share of metropolitan agency commis- 
sions. Further disclosures were to the effect that dis- 
bursements classified as legal expense ranged from 
$250,000 to $300,000 every year from 1898 to 1904, 
amounts far in excess of proper legal demands ; that a 
residence was maintained at Albany whence a close 
watch was kept on the New York legislature, the rent, 
supplies, wages of cooks and servants being charged 
to legal expense; that the Mutual, Equitable and the 
New York Life, in order to establish a systematic con- 
trol of legislation, divided the country outside of New 
York into three districts, as Pompey and Crassus 
and Caesar once divided the Roman empire. It ap- 
peared that the Mutual made large contributions to a 
political campaign fund, that the Mutual owned stocks 
in banks and trust companies in which its officers 
were also interested, and that the Mutual's deposits 
were being used to promote these institutions, that 
the officers would participate in underwriting syndi- 
cates and with the aid of the Mutual's funds reap im- 
mense profits, that the Mutual's enormous growth had 
not resulted in advantage to the policyholders, but had 
served as an excuse for an increase of expense and 
lavish payments to officers and agents, that while the 
volume of business had increased returns to policy- 
holders had diminished. Similar conditions were un- 
covered in the New York Life and the Equitable. In 
the New York Life the salary of the president had been 
increased from $50,000 to $75,000 in 1896, to $100,000 
in 1901, and the total salaries of executive officers from 
$149,000 in 1893 to $322,000 in 1905, an increase of 
more than 216 per cent. The investigation showed 

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The Woodmen of the World 



that the officers had been permitted to disburse enor- 
mous sums without proper accounting and that the 
transactions of Andrew Hamilton, who had super- 
vision of matters of legislation and taxation, exhibited 
"enormous abuses." It was shown that this com- 
pany contributed great sums to political campaign 
funds and made apparently every effort to conceal the 
items in the company's books. It was further shown 
that pretended entries of false stock sales had been fre- 
quently made, that the books were manipulated to hide 
many questionable deals, especially syndicate opera- 
tions, that the wonderful growth of the company had 
been at the expense of the policyholder, there being a 
large diminution in returns to him. In the Equitable 
it developed that the salary of President Hyde was in- 
creased from $75,000 in 1886 to $100,000 in 1894, that 
of President Alexander from $75,000 in 1899 to $100,- 
000 in 1903. James H. Hyde, the president's son, was 
graduated from college in 1898 and in November of that 
year was made second vice-president. In 1899, soon 
after his father's death, he was made vice-president at a 
salary of $20,000. This was increased in 1900 to $30,- 
000, in 1902 to $75,000, and in 1903, although he was 
only 27 years of age and practically without experience, 
to $100,000. The total office pay roll of this company 
increased from $770,000 in 1900 to over $1,100,000 in 
1904. When Paul Morton became president his sal- 
ary was $100,000, but was later reduced to $80,000. He 
had been receiving $8,000 as Secretary of the Navy. 
It was also demonstrated that in the Equitable dis- 
bursements for legal expense had been unwarrantedly 
large, that extensive contributions had been made to 
political campaign funds, that the company's assets 
had been manipulated for the control of the trust 
companies and the floating of securities for the enrich- 

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The Woodmen of the World 



ment of officers and directors, that there were real 
estate transactions of questionable character, and that 
the great growth of the company had, like that of the 
other companies, been obtained at excessive cost to 
the policyholder whose returns had strikingly dimin- 
ished. When we contemplate the power of these offi- 
cers and directors, their opportunities for plunder, 
it esems wonderful that instead of taking millions 
they did not take tens of millions. The famous re- 
mark of Lord Clive is brought forcibly to mind. He 
was being examined by parliament in reference to 
the riches he had pilfered from the palaces and treas- 
uries of India. He described the gilded halls where 
treasures were piled in profligate abundance and 
where he appropriated about a million and a half 
when he could easily have taken fifteen or twenty mil- 
lions. "When I think, gentlemen," he said, "that I took 
only a million and a half when I could have easily 
taken fifteen or twenty times that much, I am aston- 
ished at my own moderation." 

It was demonstrated by the findings of the Arm- 
strong committee, it is evident from the most cursory 
inspection of conditions, that the principal old line com- 
panies, unless properly regulated, will become a men- 
ace to the nation's welfare and the people's liberties. 
They now have total assets of over two billions and a 
quarter. This fabulous sum, the toy of a few masters of 
finance, has been wrung from the people by extortion- 
ate charges and glittering promises. In order to 
induce the payments of heavy premiums the compa- 
nies have diverted the popular mind from pure life in- 
surance and added the fascinating elements of sur- 
render values, loans and cash returns. They have 
given the insurance policy a present value realizable 
for the holder's benefit when from the standpoint of 

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The Woodmen of the World 



pure insurance it should have a future value realiza- 
ble only by the holder's family. If the people would 
insist upon pure life insurance there would be no vast 
accumulations to overshadow government and threat- 
en freedom. The companies have ingeniously directed 
the policyholder's attention to his own material ad- 
vantage; they have perverted the true principle of life 
insurance which has in it no element of gain for self 
but every element of love and help for others. It is 
true that since the developments of 1905 the policy- 
holders of the various companies have made and are 
making serious efforts to assert and to assume control. 
Stricter laws have been adopted by the New York leg- 
islature and the companies themselves have made cer- 
tain concessions and reforms. But the direct system 
of voting for trustees in person, by proxy or by mail 
has not been changed ; and as long as this system pre- 
vails the policyholders will be powerless and the old 
abuses may recur at any time. The number of policy- 
holders is too great, the territory too vast, the system 
too cumbersome. Control will inevitably center in the 
active and all-powerful few unless by legislation or 
otherwise the companies are required to establish a 
definite and practicable system of representative gov- 
ernment. 

The self-governing, co-operative character of the 
fraternal order enables it to provide insurance at cost 
plus the smallest possible amount for expense. The 
fraternal order has no additional charge for speculative 
or investment features; from these it is entirely free. 
The management is answerable to the membership; 
extravagance and peculation are impossible on any 
permanent or extensive scale. The immediate dis- 
bursement of the funds of fraternals to meet death loss- 
es has removed all opportunity for serious temptation 

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The Woodmen of the World 



or corruption. The fraternal order has no accumula- 
tions beyond such as are absolutely necessary to ma- 
ture its policies. Indeed, the fraternal orders have en- 
countered their most serious difficulties from the fact 
that in many instances their rates have been too low 
to meet ordinary mortuary liabilities. Most of them 
began on the assessment plan, a plan which was 
illogical and unsatisfactory. In the endeavor to avoid 
the excessive charges of the old line system they went 
in the beginning too far the other way and have had 
to struggle with the disadvantages of inadequate 
charges. Under the assessment plan, the plan inaugu- 
rated by the first American fraternal orders, no collec- 
tions were made until the deaths had actually occurred. 
Then followed a modification of this plan by which the 
current cost was apportioned and collected at stated 
periods. The inherent vice of this method lay in the 
presumption that the current cost would remain al- 
ways the same. No provision was made for accumu- 
lations to meet the increasing cost of increasing age. 
The practice of collecting charges too low to permit 
such accumulation, charges barely sufficient to meet 
current cost, is still persisted in by some fraternal or- 
ders, among which, I regret to say, is the largest fra- 
ternal order of the time. Whatever may be said in jus- 
tification of such a practice in the early days of fra- 
ternal orders when definite information was lacking 
and all pathways were untried, it is in the light of 
the knowledge and progress of the present without 
any possible palliation. It is known to be a defi- 
ance of the plainest laws of mortality and mathe- 
matics and unless the necessary alterations are made 
disaster is inevitable. I do not say that my own order, 
the Woodmen of the World, is perfect. It is practi- 
cally on the level payment plan, however, a plan which 

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The Woodmen of the World 



provides an emergency reserve fund, and it is in 
my judgment as near the proper solution of the fra- 
ternal mortality question as it is possible for it to be 
in the present state of fraternal insurance development. 
With its emergency fund and its accumulative certifi- 
cate I believe it to be in position to meet and finally 
overcome every obstacle and every storm. Owing to 
the former prevalence of the assessment method in all 
fraternal orders the name "assessment" is today applied 
to these orders although many of them have dropped 
the early system altogether. The survival and gen- 
eral employment of this term in connection with all 
fraternal orders have confused the public mind to 
such an extent that many still regard all fraternal or- 
ders as assessment institutions. The government of 
the Woodmen of the World is completely representa- 
tive, more representative, indeed, than the government 
of any American state or of the American republic 
itself. There is no executive veto in the Woodmen of 
the World. The members exercise an absolute con- 
trol through a national legislative body known as the 
Sovereign Camp. For representative purposes the 
country is divided into a convenient number of Head 
Camps all of which are within easy access of the sub- 
ordinate Camps in their respective territories. Every 
subordinate Camp is entitled to representation at its 
Head Camp. The Head Camps choose from their 
membership the delegates who compose the Sover- 
eign Camp and the Sovereign Camp elects execu- 
tive officers and enacts all legislation necessary to 
carry on the institution. The Woodmen of the World 
is a republic of the truest type, the most exalted ideals. 
The humblest member is eligible to the highest office. 
The Woodmen of the World is exactly what its mem- 
bers make it; they own and control it; it is of the 

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The Woodmen of the World. 



membership, by the membership and for the member- 
ship. The destinies of this order rest absolutely in the 
hands and hearts of the individual members. My Sov- 
ereigns, it is your institution, the bulwark of your 
homes, the palladium of your firesides, the ornament of 
your souls. Upon your interest and energy depends 
its welfare, yea, its life. Without your active aid it 
cannot thrive. It is held aloft, this glorious structure 
of brotherly love, upon your stalwart arms; if you 
withdraw them it must fall. 

The Woodmen of the World embodies the elements 
of freedom, of order and of progress. Its purposes 
are as holy as they are practical. They consist 
in the protection and in the preservation of the 
basic factors of society and government. It cannot 
be disputed that the unit of civilization is the home. 
The individual ownership of homes is the surest sup- 
port of social order — its absence the opportunity of the 
mob. A country without homes is a breeding ground 
of anarchy and revolution. Without homes there can- 
not long remain even the semblance of progressive so- 
ciety. Without homes mankind becomes a mere sav- 
age mass capable only of the rudest and most primi- 
tive ideas of life. The true measure of human happi- 
ness is the development of the home. Men builded 
homes before they builded governments. The first 
ideas of government were obtained from the miniature 
dominion of the family and the home. Thus the home 
precedes and underlies all government. When the 
home ceases to be the inspiration of human toil, the 
chief object of human care, the disappearance of all 
government and society, of all freedom, culture and 
advancement, is inevitable. We may sing of liberty. 
We may boast of the form of a republic, of imposing 
cities, of the riches of forest and factory and shop and 

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mine. But if the plain citizens of the country are with- 
out homes our vaunted government of the free is an 
empty name. 

Love of country is founded on the love of home. 
Some of the most conspicuous examples of human 
valor have occurred in defense of country and of home. 
Some months ago I visited New York, the chief city of 
this republic, where every nation of the earth is repre- 
sented. On an occasion of general interest and amuse- 
ment, when every element of the population was in 
attendance, I heard a famous band render the songs 
peculiar to the various countries. A more affecting 
scene could hardly be imagined. With the first note 
descended a hush upon the multitude prompted by the 
sympathy of a common anticipation. First rose the 
imperial strains of "Rule Britannia," expressing all the 
pride and strength of empire, an ode to British deeds 
and British hopes — 

"When Britain first at heaven's command, 

Arose from out the azure main; 
This was the charter of the land, 

And guardian angels sang this strain, 
'Rule, Britannia, rule the waves, 
Britons never will be slaves, — ' " 

and every Briton in that great concourse dreamed 
again of Windermere, the gentle Severn, the historic 
Thames, the Cumbrian summits, the vales of Glouces- 
ter and the Surrey hills. Then burst the thunders of 
the Marseillaise — 

"Ye sons of France awake to glory, 

Hark! hark! what myriads bid ye rise; 
Your children, wives and grandsires hoary, 
Behold their tears and hear their cries, — " 

and every son of France answered in his soul the sum- 

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The Woodmen of the World 



mons to his country's cause, reveled in her history as 
the figures of Charlemagne, Joan of Arc, Napoleon rose 
before him, and saw again the mountains of Auvergne, 
the impetuous Rhone, the purple vineyards, the forest 
of Ardennes. 

From the silver-throated instruments now poured 
the martial measures of Germany's celebrated anthem, 
"The Watch O'er the Rhine"— 

"With thunder's shout the air is rent, 
Like roar of waves and sword-clash blent; 
Now of the German Rhine so free, 
Who will the river's guardian be, — " 

and every German recalled the victory of Arminius 
over the flower of Roman soldiery in Teutoburger 
forest and thought with dimming eyes of the far- 
throned land between the Matterhorn and the sea. 

Then came the airs of Scotland, and every Scottish 
heart leaped to the trumpet call of Robert Bruce — 

"Scots wha hae with Wallace bled, 
Scots wham Bruce has aften led; 
Welcome to your gory bed, 
Or to victory, — " 

and throbbed with sorrow deep and infinite in mem- 
ory of Loch Lomond and the Clyde as there followed 
the slow, sad melody of "Auld Lang Syne." And then 
there quivered a refrain that spoke the anguish of a 
broken heart, the grief of Ireland at the tomb of a de- 
parted nationality — 

"The harp that once through Tara's halls, 
The soul of music shed, 
Now hangs as mute on Tara's walls 
As if that soul were fled, — " 

and tears fell fast from Irish eyes as in fancy reap- 

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The Woodmen of the World 



peared the humble homes upon the Shannon, the 
Blackwater and the Boyne, the cots of Galway and 
Tyrone, and as the woes of that rare and gifted people 
who have contributed so brilliantly to the liberty and 
the progress of the earth were voiced in that pathetic 
song. 

And then, O then, there fell upon the enraptured 
air an enthralling cadence, a song that upleaping thun- 
dered until angelic choirs from battlements invisible 
seemed to shout it on to God, expressing all the valor 
and devotion of a valorous and devoted people — 

"America, 'tis of thee, 
Sweet land of liberty, 
Of thee I sing," 

and every American heart was thrilled. 

I repeat that the love of home is the most universal 
emotion of the human heart. I assert that the protec- 
tion of the home should be the most universal object 
of human effort. I submit that the Woodmen of the 
World and similar organizations whose chief aim is 
to preserve and to elevate the home are performing a 
work of permanent and fundamental importance. In- 
deed, they are the greatest home-builders of the age. 

The Woodmen of the World protects the home be- 
cause it teaches reverence for those who compose it — 
the mother, the wife, the child. There is in all litera- 
ture no grander tribute to the mothers of men than 
Joaquin Miller's "The Bravest Battle," which I here 
repeat by the especial permission of that great lover 
of humanity: 

"The bravest battle that ever was fought, 
Shall I tell you where and when? 
On the maps of the world you'll find it not; 
'Twas fought by the mothers of men. 

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The Woodmen of the World 



Nay, not with cannon or battle shot, 

With sword or nobler pen; 
Nay, not with eloquent words or thought, 

From mouths of wonderful men. 

But deep in a walled-up woman's heart — 

Of woman that would not yield, 
But bravely, silently bore her part — 

Lo, there was the battlefield. 

No marshalling troops, no bivouac song, 

No banners to gleam and wave; 
But, oh! these battles, they last so long, 

From babyhood to the grave. 

Yet faithful still as a bridge of stars, 

She fights in her walled-up town — 
Fights on and in the endless wars, 

Then silent, unseen — goes down. 

Oh, ye with banners and battle shot, 

And soldiers to shout and praise, 
I tell you the kingliest victories fought 

Were fought in these silent ways. 

Oh, spotless woman in a world of shame! 

With a splendid and silent scorn, 
Go back to God as white as you came, 

The kingliest warrior born." 

In protecting the mother Woodcraft preserves and 
shields the home. I can conceive of no sublimer 
picture than that of a man surrounded by a happy and 
devoted family. It is to me a more splendid scene 
than all the portrayals of martial glory in the battle- 
galleries of the world. The radiance of a contented 
fireside is brighter than that of all the thrones of earth. 
Especially is this true if provision has been made for 
the family in the event of the protector's death. The 
crisis in the life of every family and the history of 
every home is the death of the provider. The Wood- 

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The Woodmen of the World 



men of the World and kindred orders, representing the 
fraternal system of life insurance, were established for 
the especial purpose of giving life insurance to the 
people in the cheapest possible form and of making it 
possible for the masses whose circumstances as a rule 
are moderate to secure protection for their families and 
their homes. The Woodmen of the World gives the 
principle of insurance its most logical and fraternal ex- 
pression. It is an attractive embodiment of the ideas 
of liberty, equality and fraternity. Its ritual combines 
the beauty of sentiment, the symmetry of truth, the 
logic of fact. The scene of its ceremonies — the symbol 
of its territory — is the forest, the great fraternity 
of nature, where the oak is brother to the shrub and 
the mountain mother to the flower. The emblems 
of its teachings are the implements with which the 
lower foundations of civilization were constructed — 
the axe, the beetle and the wedge. It illustrates 
the doctrine of equality in the erection of substan- 
tial monuments at the graves of all its dead. Its 
monuments teach that the performance of the funda- 
mental duties of existence, the protection of the 
family and the home, are within the reach of every 
man. Its monuments proclaim that the man who 
makes provision for his loved ones is as much entitled 
to commemorative marble as the conqueror and the 
king. Woodcraft is brotherhood aflame. It teaches 
that in manhood, not in millions, it found the proper 
test of human worth. It teaches that the stain of hon- 
est toil is the insignia of a true nobility. It teaches that 

"There's glory in the shuttle's song, 
There's triumph in the anvil's stroke; 
There's merit in the brave and strong, 
Who dig the mine and fell the oak." 



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The Woodmen of the World 



Woodcraft rejects the tawdry distinctions of wealth 
and rank and pomp and all the vulgar jewelry of pride. 
It pronounces blasphemous the social system which 
requires one man to call another man "My Lord." In 
this connection let me mention a just rebuke which was 
administered by a plain Irish Woodman to a member 
of the aristocratic class. It is said that the latter was 
visiting in this country and while on the streets of 
one of our large cities asked the Irishman to direct 
him to a certain business house. The Irishman hap- 
pened to be going that way and offered to guide his in- 
quirer to the place. As they walked along Pat, to be 
friendly, asked, "And who might you be?" His com- 
panion drew himself up with dignity and replied: "I 
am the Honorable John Kenneth Edgerton, Knight 
of the Garter, Knight of the Bath, Knight of St. 
John, Knight of the Golden Fleece, Knight of the 
Loyal Legion and Knight of the Iron Cross. And 
whom have I the honor of addressing?" Pat for a 
single instant was bewildered with this long list, but he 
quickly recovered, threw out his chest and responded 
pompously: "I am Patrick Timothy O'Flannigan of 
Hoboken, tonoight, lasht noight, noight before lasht, 
noight before that, tomorrow noight, the noight follow- 
ing and every other bloody noight of the wake, includ- 
ing Sunday noight, begorra." 

History presents no sublimer spectacle than the 
grand army of 750,000 Woodmen of the World march- 
ing not to destroy, but to preserve, not to wound, but 
to heal, not to conquer, but to save. No warlike note 
incites to bloody charge and frightful conflict. No 
screaming shell, no shrieking shot surround these sol- 
diers of humanity. They are cheered by songs and 
prayers from 750,000 American firesides. Let us from 
some eminence of fancy review this mighty army. First 

114 



The Woodmen of the World 



appear the advance guards from the District of Colum- 
bia, the Dakotas, Maryland, Rhode Island and New 
Jersey, the sovereigns on the frontiers of Woodcraft 
who are preparing the way for its triumphant extension. 

Next sweep into view the flying squadrons, a thou- 
sand to five thousand strong from Arizona, land of 
the topaz and the amethyst, an empire of the strange, 
a kingdom of the wonderful — from Connecticut, the 
first state to adopt the American constitution, its shops 
and factories humming an ode of progress from the 
Housatonic to the Thames — from Illinois, one of 
earth's commercial pillars, a happy theater for Wood- 
craft's future achievements — from New Mexico, land 
of mystery more profound than all the Orient, of more 
historic interest than Babylon or Thebes — from West 
Virginia, the Switzerland of America, a promising field 
for the propagation of our principles. 

And now we see the charging columns of five to 
twenty thousand Woodmen from New York, the em- 
porium of a hemisphere — from Alabama, land of chiv- 
alry, romance and natural fascination — from Florida, 
resplendent with the jewelry of nature, the Italy of 
the Occident — from Georgia, foremost in every struggle 
of intellect, of industry and of arms — from Indiana, 
notable for the liberality and enlightenment of its peo- 
ple — from Kansas, radiant with an exhaustless fertil- 
ity— -from Kentucky, land of eloquence and beauty, of 
scenery and song — from Michigan, rich in minerals 
and men — from Minnesota, the heart and center 
of a continent — from North Carolina, where was 
established the first English settlement in America — 
from Oklahoma, the Eden of the west — from Penn- 
sylvania, where assembled the first congress of the 
American colonies — from Virginia, the patriot's shrine, 
the commonwealth that gave Washington to America 

115 



The Woodmen of the World 



and wrote on the forehead of eternity the fadeless name 
of Robert Lee — from Wisconsin, gemmed with lakes, 
adorned with rivers, its institutions reflecting brother- 
hood and love. 

And now we observe the next division of the enor- 
mous host, the legions of Woodcraft, numbering ten 
thousand to twenty-five thousand sovereigns — from 
Iowa, the granary of the nation — from Louisiana, 
redolent with the jessamine and the cane — from Ne- 
braska, a kingdom of corn, its chief city the headquar- 
ters of the Woodmen of the World — from Ohio, 
perhaps the most typical American commonwealth- — 
from South Carolina, stained with the blood of heroes 
from the Blue Ridge to the sea — from Tennessee, 
exemplifying the proudest traditions of free govern- 
ment. 

Next swing into position two brigades of Wood- 
men, the one composed of thirty-five thousand sov- 
ereigns from Arkansas, the Cipango of the future, the 
other comprising thirty thousand choppers from Mis- 
souri, state of historic associations and unmeasured 
resources, its government the consummation of free- 
dom's dreams and freemen's aspirations. 

And now wheels proudly into line a phalanx of 
forty thousand Woodmen from Mississippi, whose 
citizens on battlefield and in legislative chamber 
have repeatedly risen to the loftiest capabilities of 
human genius and courage. But what myriads 
are these now pouring on the field? Stretching 
far into the distance, until the eye exhausted drops, 
they are forming in endless and imposing array. Be- 
neath their tread the earth is shaking and one hundred 
and sixty thousand Woodmen from Texas surge to 
the forefront of the Woodmen army, from Texas, with 
star-daring crags and peaks sublime, its prairies gleam- 

116 



The Woodmen of the World 



ing in the light that lies between the Rio Grande and 
the Red, its fields ablossom with the cotton's summer 
snow, its landscapes painted by the gods. 

The great army is at last assembled. Suddenly 
storm on storm of acclamation bursts from the gath- 
ered thousands as there steps before the fraternal sol- 
diery the leader of leaders, the greatest figure in the 
history of fraternal development, an inspiration in his 
soul, a glory on his brow, the incarnation of nobility, a 
prince of peace, a king of love, an emperor of human- 
ity, the Washington of Woodcraft, Joseph Cullen Root. 
God multiply his years for the continued elevation of 
the race, the increasing effectiveness of the order, the 
further salvation of mother, wife, of home and child! 



^ 



117 



UNVEILING ORATION AT GRAVES OF 

SOVEREIGNS NASON, BAUGH, 

LITTLE, ROBISON, GENTRY, 

BURGER. 

THERE is no subject worthy of profounder 
reflection than the grave. It is the most 
universal fact in all the records and traditions 
of humanity. It is a topic familiar to all ages, peoples 
and all climes. It presents its mysteries with equal 
force to the savage in the cave and the scholar 
in the cloister. As it gathered to its barren bosom 
the first man who trod the virgin earth so shall 
it fold upon its breast of clay the man whose death 
shall mark the extinction of the race, the exodus of 
time. It is unaffected by history or geography. It 
knows no zones, no latitudes. It is indifferent alike 
to snow and sun and rain. Men may differ in culture, 
creed and nationality. They may reside in the most 
distant islands of Polynesia in painted savagery and 
ignorance primeval, on the steppes of Asia recalling 
in their nomadic lives the state of man when history 
first reveals him, in arctic or antarctic regions where 
cold perpetual makes mere physical subsistence the 
consuming object of human energy, or in the modern 
structures of New York and London surrounded by 
every luxury and facility. Nay, twenty centuries with 
world-transforming wars, with the annihilation of 
governments and peoples, the destruction of continent- 
marking boundaries, the disappearance of immemorial 
languages and customs, may separate the ages in 
which they lived. They are identical in the dust. 

Into the abysses of the tomb humanity's multiply- 
ing myriads pour. The dark battalions crowd the high- 

118 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

ways of the centuries to gather every mortal for the 
march on which retreat is never sounded. Fugitives 
may wander from the fated company and the dreaded 
path and seek remotest deserts, crags most perilous, 
dimmest wildernesses, wildest plains, but never do 
they pass beyond the trumpet-call of that perpetual 
advance. Loiterers may pause amid the enchantments 
by the way, the fountains, jewels, flowers, feasts, — 
yea, pause and for one rapturous moment dream that 
life shall riot on forever, but they must join that 
hurrying throng. The summons rings throughout 
all seasons, the lull of spring, the summer's hush, 
the stir of autumn and the winter's tumult; it echoes 
through the shadow-pillared aisles of night, the vault- 
ing dawn, the sinking day. It penetrates the silences 
of mine and cave; of peak and cliff, the clamor of the 
market-place; its sharp, swift notes like javelins of 
melody pierce the storm. The bugles of the sepulcher 
resound from sea to sea, from mart to mart, from na- 
tion unto nation, and as the obedient millions tomb- 
ward turn back rolls the quavering cry, — "Dying, dy- 
ing, dying." 

Let us follow these dismal trumpetings as they peal 
across the hills and seas to gather conscripts for the 
involuntary squadrons of the grave. On every air the 
plaintive strains are floating. They beat against the 
columned palaces and monarchs totter from the 
throne, against the massive capitals and statesmen 
stagger from the tribune, against the towering temples 
and priests reel from the altar, against the tabernacles 
of the law and judges swoon upon the bench, against 
resplendent banquet halls and revellers fade from 
groaning boards. They echo in the fields and laborers 
prostrate fall, on rivers and nerveless hands guide 
fragile barks no more, on oceans and sheeted bodies 

119 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

drop from swaying ships, in deserts and shallow graves 
protrude from shifting sands, in cities and toilers, 
idlers, the pious, the depraved, the righteous and un- 
righteous, all are cold and still. 

They arrest the cringing Nero in his useless flight. 
He shrinks and cowers in the shadow of his doom. 
The tyrant who has condemned and tortured thou- 
sands trembles when the hour of his own destruction 
strikes. Urged by his slaves to perish quickly in order 
to escape the infamies of execution he bids them to 
prepare his grave and pyre and monument, yet hesi- 
tates and with an arrogance which the proximity of 
death could not abash exclaims, "Qualis artifex pereo," 
"What an artist to perish!" A courier arrives an- 
nouncing that the senate has ordained for him the 
slow death of the scourge. In utter horror he attempts 
to end his own existence but his courage wanes. He 
begs that someone show him how to die and blushing 
at the fright he cannot hide, with weakest bravado 
composes pompous, self-exalting epigrams. The rapid 
strokes of horses' hoofs announce the coming of his 
captors. He feebly holds a dagger to his throat and a 
menial drives it home. 

They surge against the couch of Mirabeau, and the 
mighty orator, conscious of his lot and master of his 
agony, pours from his ashen lips a torrent of such 
prophetic eloquence that it may appropriately be re- 
peated here. "When I am no more my worth will be- 
come known. The misfortunes which I have 
held back will then pour on all sides upon France ; the 
criminal faction which now trembles before me will 
be unbridled. I have before my eyes unbounded pre- 
sentiments of disaster. We now see how much we 
erred in not preventing the commons from assuming 
the name of the National Assembly ; since they gained 

120 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

that victory they have never ceased to show them- 
selves unworthy of it. They have chosen to govern 
the king instead of governing by him; but soon 
neither he nor they will rule the country; but a vile 
faction which will overspread it with horrors." A 
tremor thrills the classic frame. When all else is pulse- 
less the brow and eye retain the fire of action and the 
last exclamation leaves the gifted tongue, — "sprinkle 
me with perfume, crown me with flowers that I may 
thus enter the eternal sleep." 

They flow on viewless currents into the tribunal 
where Robert Emmett fronts his fate and the farewell 
to his country and the court remains through time a 
hymn of liberty. "Let no man write my epitaph; for 
as no man who knows my motives dare now vindicate 
them, let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. 
Let them and me repose in obscurity and peace, and 
my tomb remain uninscribed until other times and 
other men can do justice to my character. When my 
country takes her place among the nations of the earth 
— then, and not till then — let my epitaph be written. 
I have done." 

They break upon the distant rock in desert seas 
and welcome the wasted exile, the solitary figure of a 
splendid desolation, the embodiment of majestic ruin, 
to the refuge of the grave. The devoted watchers catch 
the whispers of the last delirium, "France, the army," 
and that marvelous energy expires. The faithful Mar- 
chand folds about the conqueror's conquered clay the 
cloak he wore at Marengo when first the lightnings of 
his genius began to play against the bayonets of oppos- 
ing Europe. 

But we need not follow further the carrion cry of 
death. We have seen that men encounter the inevit- 
able moment with varying attitudes and emotions. 

121 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

"The tongues of dying men 
Enforce attention like deep harmony; 
Where words are scarce they're seldom spent in vain, 
For they breathe true that breathe their words in pain." 

Varied and impressive as are the fantasies and 
philosophies of the past they cannot fully portray the 
sorrow inflicted by the grave. No lip or lyre may ever 
speak the woe it wreaks. The deepest agonies are un- 
spoken ; the most violent griefs unsung. In the Vatican 
there is a marble group more than twenty centuries old 
which typifies perhaps the most remarkable effort of 
the sculptor to fashion a monument of human pain. 
It represents Laocoon and his sons in the coils of two 
gigantic serpents. Laocoon, son of Antenor and priest 
of Neptune, was, the legend runs, a Trojan of that stir- 
ring age when the Greeks were waging the memorable 
war with Troy. The besiegers, prompted by Minerva, 
had contrived the stratagem of the wooden horse and 
had drawn the monster near the Trojan gates. Per- 
suaded by the treacherous eloquence of Ulysses, the 
unsuspecting Trojans were about to admit the deadly 
engine. Divining the imposition Laocoon flung a spear 
against the side of the enormous steed and the clang 
of arms betrayed the Grecian soldiers concealed within. 
Having exposed the danger Laocoon and his sons 
proposed a sacrifice to Neptune on the Trojan shore. 
Angered at the failure of the enterprise Minerva sent 
two huge serpents to destroy the patriotic priest. Glid- 
ing across the sea they came and wrapped their sinister 
folds about the struggling Laocoon and his sons. In 
this attitude the group is perpetuated by the sculptor. 
The countenance of Laocoon is distorted with the 
anguish of a hideous death while every muscle swells 
out against the horrible embrace. 

122 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

The fate of Prometheus, a character in mythology, 
has been the subject of perhaps the most notable ef- 
forts in all literature to reveal the depths of agony. 
For his kindness to the sons of men in preserving 
for them the use of fire which through a shrewd de- 
ception he spirited from the abode of Jove he in- 
curred the hatred of the god of gods. Among the 
frozen wastes of Scythia on the northern sea he was 
chained naked to a swaying cliff. Through countless 
years he was exposed to night and sleet and storm. 
Vultures fed upon his living flesh, the wounds fast 
healing to be again dissevered. To make his suffering 
more intense he was permitted to lose neither con- 
sciousness nor life. In titanic despair he shouted to 
the storms, the thunders, and the snows: 

"O, holy Aether, and swift-winged winds, 
And river-wells and laughter innumerous, 
Of yon sea waves. Earth, mother of us all, 
And all-viewing cyclic suns, I cry on you, 
Behold me a god, what I endure from gods, 
How, wasted by this woe, 
I wrestle down the myriad years of time." 

But vivid as are these examples of misery they can- 
not completely signify the terror which the grave may 
inspire. And this terror may under certain conditions 
become infinitely intensified. I do not believe that the 
combined tragedies of the world can equal the horror 
felt by one who on the bed of death finds himself sur- 
rounded by a family for whom he has made no pro- 
vision. Let us observe the spectacle that affrights his 
fading eyes. He sees the loving, loyal figure of his 
wife. He recalls the lustrous days of youth. Again 
she wears the rose and charm of the intoxicating hours 
when first he laid the flower of his manhood at her feet. 
Again her brow suffuses like a lily dipped in crimson 

123 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

with the first emotions of love. He hears again the 
solemn ceremony, the transporting music, the joyous 
clamor of assembled friends when surrendering home, 
identity and name she merged her being into his. 
He sees the weary years of contest with the world 
and how from all the storms and shocks of con- 
flict he found a refuge in her loyalty and love, her cour- 
age and consolation illuminating the darkest hour. To 
the beautiful relation of wife he sees her add the divine 
capacity of mother. He sees her labors and her duties 
multiply as she guides the little feet in pathways safe 
and pure. He hears again the hymns she sang, the 
prayers she whispered. And as these loved ones gather 
around him now, bedewing his couch with tears, the 
thought of their future transfixes him like a sword 
of flame. He had been a generous and devoted hus- 
band but like many of his fellow-men he had neglected 
to make definite provision for the emergency which 
now confronts him. And as that weeping group re- 
cedes before his dimming vision he pictures what may 
be their fate. Perhaps he sees a garret bare and deso- 
late, a half-protected opening in the roof that admits 
the winter with the light. He sees the haggard faces 
of his wife and children, hands stained with toil — per- 
haps with crime, lips that once pealed with laughter 
now lax and wan with hunger and with cold, the bride 
of his stalwart years the spouse of poverty — in her 
cheeks the ashes of memory and hope — in her heart 
the corpse of happiness and faith. Can language voice 
or sculpture fashion the horror of that soul as it sinks 
beneath the sorrowful gaze of the neglected family? 
If that man's dying lips could speak his screams would 
make Laocoon cease to writhe and Prometheus forget 
his agony. 

It is a proposition beyond the pale of argument that 

124 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

life insurance is the most definite and permanent form 
of protection against the pecuniary consequences of 
death. And yet it is unfortunately true that only one 
person out of every four of insurable age in the United 
States carries a life insurance policy. Almost every 
moment families in despairing grief are rising from 
the graves of their providers to face the problems of 
existence unprotected, unaided and unprepared. In 
this condition lies the most fruitful source of poverty 
and crime. It may be truly said that the man who fails 
to utilize the innumerable opportunities offered him 
in this enlightened age to guard his family against the 
misfortune of his death is not only recreant to duty 
and to affection but pursues a course subversive of 
the best interests of society. 

Gratifying, therefore, is the knowledge of the fact 
that the men who sleep beneath these Woodmen mon- 
uments were not forgetful of the fundamental obliga- 
tions of humanity. These monuments are perpetual 
trumpet-tongues proclaiming that in America there is 
a fraternal organization whose members place duty 
to family next to duty to God. The Sovereigns whose 
monuments we dedicate today died with an assurance 
so sweet, a consolation so tender, that the shadows 
of the grave dissolved into the radiance of immortality. 
No visions of deserted responsibility haunted their 
departing hours. They saw peaceful and protected 
homes where their names would be gently spoken and 
their memories affectionately preserved. The Sover- 
eigns these monuments commemorate belong to glory. 
In adhering to the principles of Woodcraft they have 
won a brighter laurel than that which binds the brow 
of human fame. Like Joshua they have been buried 
upon the borders of their inheritance. 

Through membership in the Woodmen of the 
125 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

World they exemplified the principle of fraternity, the 
loftiest principle and the sweetest sentiment that men 
may ever know or feel, the basis of equality, the foun- 
tain of liberty, — a principle that found its most beau- 
tiful and effective illustration in the life and deeds of 
Christ. 

The distinctions of earth are fortuitous and transi- 
tory. They are dependent largely on the caprice of 
circumstance and environment. The operation of 
chance in history is a subject of most astonishing rev- 
elations. Nearly 2,500 years ago eleven Athenian gen- 
erals met in council of war on the heights overlooking 
the plain of Marathon. They had been summoned to 
decide whether their little army of eleven thousand 
should give battle to the Persian myriads on the plain. 
It was one of the most fateful hours of human history. 
The Persian empire was the most extensive power of 
the world comprising almost all the great nations of 
antiquity. Its armies had never known defeat. They 
had subdued the Orient under Cambyses and Cyrus 
and they were now pouring upon Europe under Darius. 
Athens, representing a country smaller than Rhode 
Island, was the first outpost of Europe, the highest 
embodiment of western freedom and culture. At Ma- 
rathon Asia and Europe met in martial array. Two 
civilizations stood in arms opposed. Although the 
Athenian generals knew that the success of their op- 
ponents meant the subjugation of Athens and all 
Greece they did not grasp the world-significance of 
the contest. Five of the eleven generals voted for bat- 
tle, — five against. The deciding vote rested with Cal- 
limachus. As he weighed the respective issues and 
swayed from one opinion to the other he little dreamed 
that he was debating the destinies of the earth. He 
voted at last for immediate conflict and Athens at 

126 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

Marathon preserved the integrity of Europe and west- 
ern civilization. The situation had so developed that if 
battle had not been immediately given intrigue at 
Athens would have brought about an ignominious 
Athenian surrender. Athens represented freedom of 
government, beauty of ideal, vigor of character, inde- 
pendence of thought, individuality of action and expres- 
sion, the source of all that is highest and most lasting 
in our present civilization. Persia was typical of 
despotism, ignorance, cruelty, lack of progress, the 
utter repression of individual initiative and ambition 
which have made the Orient the most backward 
section of the globe. Such were the issues of 
Marathon. Had Persia triumphed the oriental type 
would have impressed itself on all the west and on all 
future time. Had Athens fallen then, there was no 
other state sufficiently strong to have resisted the east- 
ern advance. European history would have been ut- 
terly changed, and the conquerors, emperors, states- 
men, philosophers and poets, yea, all the great we wor- 
ship may never have been known. The vote of one 
man 2,500 years ago determined in large degree the 
subsequent history of the world. 

There has been no crisis in human affairs in which 
men have not been found sufficiently strong and great 
to meet and master all its problems. If today some 
commercial, martial or political upheaval should 
threaten the existence of the nation men would rise 
among us to thrill humanity and ornament tradition 
with the glory of their deeds. And yet these very men 
will in the absence of such conditions live out their 
appointed lives untrumpeted to fame. In the ordinary 
successes of this peaceful time the elevation of the 
individual is governed by the most fugitive uncer- 
tainties. The softest breeze may break the gossa- 

127 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

mer of fortune. And those who wear the title of 
authority, the circlet of place, are rising on a waxen 
wing. Failure to attain celebrity or high position 
reflects not on the ability, the energy, the merit or 
the ambition of man. Above the vanities and uncer- 
tainties of earth are the eternal honors which these 
Woodmen monuments signify. Duty to family, belief 
in equality and God, and love of fellow-men are the 
only lasting glories attainable by mankind. In exem- 
plifying these deathless truths with emphasis and elo- 
quence heretofore unknown the Woodmen of the 
World has become the foremost beneficiary order of 
America. The Woodmen of the World appeals to the 
loftiest aspirations of the human nature. 

In exemplification of our most impressive ceremony 
we unveil today the monuments at the graves of Sov- 
ereigns Tom Nason, James W. Baugh, Herbert Lit- 
tle, M. B. Robison, Rev. J. C. Gentry and Dr. F. W. 
Burger. 

Sovereign Tom Nason was modest and retiring. 
He boasted of no quality that he did not possess. He 
passed so quietly among the busy multitudes that his 
presence was almost unobserved. Yet in affection he 
was loyal, in honor firm. He died a member of the 
Woodmen Camp at Waco on October 6, 1901. He 
realized the necessity and utilized the opportunity of 
providing for dependent ones. May blessings guard 
his grave and enshrine his memory ! 

Sovereign James W. Baugh was born at Brown- 
wood, Tex., in September, 1868, where his early life 
was passed. He removed to Waco where he married 
in September, 1897. He was a devoted husband, a 
gentle father, a faithful Woodman. His upright life 
and lovable disposition gained him a multitude of 
friends. He was as ambitious as he was popular but 

128 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

a fell disease crushed all his youthful energy and he 
died at Waco in September, 1903. May the God of 
Woodcraft and the world protect the wife and child 
and lead them safely through the shadows and the 
storms of earth! 

Sovereign Herbert Little was born at Charleston, 
S. C, in November, 1865. At an early age he removed 
to Alabama and later entered Oxford College in that 
state. At the age of 16 he came to Waco, where he 
remained until his premature death in August, 1900. 
He was married in December, 1888, four lovely chil- 
dren garlanding the happy union. His final years were 
consumed by a heroic struggle against a slow but re- 
sistless malady. He was a Christian and a Woodman, 
thus combining in his life both spiritual and material 
preparation for the grave. His memory is fragrant; 
his soul secure. 

Sovereign M. B. Robison was born November 7, 
1860, and died January 29, 1904. Waco was the scene 
of his principal life-work. He was a traveling sales- 
man and was universally popular. The world does 
not give sufficient credit to the traveling man. He is 
in reality one of the great factors in modern progress. 
He is in touch with every development and in line with 
every useful innovation. His influence is beneficent 
and effective and he is a genuine power for good in 
every community in which he moves. Sovereign Robi- 
son possessed all the qualities of the highest type of 
his profession. 

Sovereign Reverend J. C. Gentry was born in Cher- 
okee County, Texas, in March, 1856. He was born 
again in the regenerating blood of Christ on July 30, 
1876, having been converted to the religion of God on 
that day. He was ordained for the ministry in 1880 and 
devoted practically his entire life to the active service 

129 



At the Graves of Nason and Others 

of the Master. He was especially prominent in gen- 
eral church work, and for more than two decades he 
was a stalwart figure among his brethren. The great 
Baptist Church never had a more faithful and untiring 
servitor. He died in August, 1902, and now abides in 
peace. 

Sovereign Dr. F. W. Burger was born at Wood- 
bury, Tenn., in December, 1849. He obtained a thor- 
ough literary training in the best schools of Murfrees- 
boro and Nashville, graduating at the age of 18. For 
several years he taught school and at the same time 
studied medicine. He came to Texas in 1875 and in 
the following year was married. In 1881 he entered 
the medical department of Tulane University at New 
Orleans and on graduating located at McGregor in 
this county. He removed to Waco in 1885 and con- 
tinued the practice of medicine until 1894 when he 
was elected County Treasurer of McLennan County. 
He was thoroughly beloved by the masses of the peo- 
ple and remained in this responsible position until his 
retirement in 1900. Having made investments through- 
out the state he removed to Dallas where he died in 
August, 1904. He was brought to Waco for burial and 
now sleeps in the soil of the county he served so well. 
He was a man of invincible energy, of determined will, 
of wide culture and enlightened public spirit. The 
entire community will long deplore his death. 

These Sovereigns who have died in Woodcraft 
felt no horror as the curtains of the grave descended. 
Their countenances were as bright as the raiment of 
Christ in the hour of the transfiguration. The death 
horror of which I have spoken is but a temporary sen- 
sation at most to him who analyzes the grave in the 
light of religion and fraternity. Religion is the parent 
of fraternity. The fatherhood of God preceded and 

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At the Graves of Nason and Others 

made possible the brotherhood of man. God's father- 
hood makes all men His children and the children of 
God are brothers by virtue of this common fatherhod. 
It follows that the man who denies his brother rejects 
his God. And we are told in writ divine that he that 
loveth not his brother abideth in death. 

These Sovereigns whose monuments we now com- 
memorate could see in heavenly hands the torches of 
brotherhood and faith converting the midnight of the 
grave into the noon of life eternal. They could feel 
the beatific presence of the power which is the plague 
of death and the destruction of the tomb. And with 
what gratification may we, their friends and brethren, 
recall the prophetic assurance that God shall wipe 
away all tears from their eyes, that there shall be 
"no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither 
shall there be any more pain, for former things are 
passed away." With what gratification do we observe 
that nature exemplifies and confirms the love and 
watchfulness of God. Not a drop of rain is lost. It 
may fall upon the summits of Sorata or Elias, of 
Everest or Mont Blanc ; it may dimple the surfaces of 
Nyanza or the Caspian, of Ontario or the Caribbean; 
it may descend on wastes of waters or of sands and 
seem to disappear forever. But it is gathered up in 
mist and cloud to refresh the seasons and renew the 
snows, to jewel every leaf and petal, to kiss the amor- 
ous earth to life again. So every mortal life, whether 
passed in splendor or in humbleness, in palaces or 
lowly habitations, on sea or shore, in mart or shop or 
field, may seem to fade forever in the clay; but it is 
garnered from the grave and borne on high to swell 
the multitudes about the seats of universal judgment. 

No human harmony expresses the sighing of the 
heart for God, the resurrection of all the disembodied 

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At the Graves of Nason and Others 

souls of men so happily as the hymn of hymns, the 
song of songs, "Nearer, My God, To Thee." 

"Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee, — " 

Eyes glistening with adoration are Godward turned and 
lips with ecstasy are parted — 

"E'en though it be a cross that raiseth me; — " 

The woe-worn brow, the bleeding heart, incline us, Lord! — 

"Still all my song shall be,—" 
No other melody shall flood the temples of the soul, 

"Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee." 

"Though like a wanderer the sun gone down, — " 
In lonely wildernesses or mountains wild, — 

"Darkness be over me, my rest a stone, — " 
No hope but God, no shield but prayer, — 

"Yet in my dreams I'd be—" 
Beneath the gorgeous image of Thy throne — 

"Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee." 

"There let the way appear steps unto heaven, — " 

As unto Jacob when of old he trod the road to Haran, — 

"All that Thou sendest me in mercy given; — " 

Thou art the source of life, the rock of strength, — 

"Angels to beckon me — " 

Earth's fading honors tempt no more — 

"Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee." 

"Then with my waking thoughts bright with Thy praise," 

Let hallelujahs fill the acclaiming hours, — 
"Out of my stony griefs Bethel I'll raise, — " 

Monuments of sighs and altars of my tears, — 
"So by my woes to be, — " 

By death exalted and through the grave made free, — 
"Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee." 

"Or if on joyful wing cleaving the sky, — " 

Wafted by a gentle wind to paradise, — 
"Sun, moon and stars forgot, upward I fly, — " 

Orion vanishes, the Pleiades recede, — 
"Still all my song shall be, — 

With all the ascending congregations of the dead, — 
"Nearer, my God, to Thee, nearer to Thee." 

132 



FRATERNITY AND WOODCRAFT. 

WE MEET today to celebrate the progress of 
fraternity. Both as a principle and as an in- 
stitution fraternity has marked the noblest 
periods and inspired the sublimest efforts in the annals 
of the race. It is proper that we should approach an 
occasion of this character with becoming reverence. 
To honor fraternity is to worship God. 

When earth was summoned from the gloom and 
deluged with a sea of light fraternity was born. The 
creation of the universe for man was an evidence of 
brotherhood between divinity and humanity. When 
life was kissed by lips omnipotent into the silent dust 
and man assumed the image of his God fraternity be- 
gan. The gift of life in the similitude of the Master 
was proof of an affinity between the creature and the 
Creator. When all the melodies of Eden charmed the 
slumber of the child of clay, when all the fragrance of 
that lovely spot imparted rapture to his dreams and 
woman blossomed at his side fraternity became an 
active principle in the life of man. The protection of 
woman is the supreme object of fraternity. When 
through the primal disobedience the founders of the 
race were driven from the haunts of ease into a world 
of pain and toil, when sword of flame and cherubim 
were placed about the fruit of everlasting life, and 
humanity was condemned to labor and to die, fraternity 
took up its mission of tenderness and love. Through 
the crowding centuries it has pursued the holy 
purposes of its existence. It has softened pain, en- 
nobled toil, and modified the consequences of death. It 
has influenced government, philosophy and law. It 
has resisted oppression; it has opposed the scepter 
and the throne. 

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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



Fraternity is brotherhood, and brotherhood sum- 
marizes the highest aspirations, the purest achieve- 
ments of mankind. Fraternity is the most universal 
force in history. It urges a child to deeds of mercy; 
it prompts an emperor to forgive. It is the source and 
guard of human liberty. It rests upon the fact that 
brotherhood is the basis of progress. It is an expres- 
sion of the fundamental truth that each man is his 
brother's keeper. 

Fraternity has prompted the sacrifices and the 
struggles of the past for freedom. It prompted Thales 
to suggest the confederacy of Teos for the establish- 
ment of Grecian independence. It made undoubted 
contribution to the cause of freedom in the codes 
of Solon and Lycurgus. It inspired the philosophy 
of Plato, the oratory of Demosthenes. It hurried 
Cincinnatus from the plow to save the Roman state. 
It prompted Flavius to restore the people's ancient 
rights. It prompted Cato and the Gracchi to oppose 
the tyranny of the dominant class. It prompted Brutus 
to defend the dying liberties of the republic. And when 
the despot's iron rule gained universal sway and free- 
dom sank into a memory and a sigh fraternity was 
reborn at Bethlehem and exalted for all time on Cal- 
vary. It found complete expression in the life of Christ. 

In the shadow of the cross He stated that the serv- 
ice of others was the real test of greatness saying to 
His disciples, "I am among ye as He that serveth." 
His death for man, for every man regardless of station 
and condition confirmed this mighty truth. Today every 
fibre of the Christian and fraternal world throbs in 
harmony with the ideals of His life. And in no way 
are these ideals more practically developed than in the 
Woodmen of the World which illustrates equality in 
its representative government, its striking ritual, its 

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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



ceremonies and its monuments, and which teaches 
fraternity through the distribution of substantial ben- 
efits in darkest moments among the humblest homes. 
In the American Declaration of Independence and 
in the American Constitution fraternity was the guid- 
ing impulse, the inspiring principle. The growth and 
glory of the American republic may be largely ascribed 
to the influence of this impulse and the operation of 
this principle. The progress of fraternity, however, 
has not been confined to America. It is arousing a 
sentiment of international brotherhood. It is leading 
the nations into closer touch and more frequent com- 
munication. It finds invaluable assistance in modern 
methods of travel and transportation. The countries 
of the world now lie side by side, held in an embrace 
of steel and steam and the invisible arms of wireless 
telegraphy. 

We have discussed the origin and nature of frater- 
nity. We have seen its operation as a motive of con- 
duct, a principle of government, a factor in progress, 
an inspiration in religion, an uplifting element in his- 
tory. We shall now consider its latest, most concrete, 
and practical expression, the fraternal insurance order. 
We have observed how completely fraternity is inter- 
woven in every essential relation of society. Applied 
to government it gives us liberty, to conduct equality. 
In the insurance order it preserves the value of every 
former relation and adds the direct financial protec- 
tion of the family and the home. 

The insurance order is to be distinguished from the 
fraternal organizations which have existed in all ages 
and all countries for the promotion of brotherhood and 
other common purposes. In early Greece were burial 
clubs and associations with rituals, degrees and bene- 
factions most notable among which were the Com- 

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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



panions of the Sun, the Sons of Minerva, and of Jupiter 
the Savior at Rhodes, the Heroists, the Oregons and 
Theisotoes. There are records of funeral benefit soci- 
eties and benevolent organizations known as Death 
Colleges in ancient Rome. Centuries before insurance 
became a factor in human affairs fraternal societies 
flourished. Founded to commemorate some great 
event, to perpetuate some honored principle, to ad- 
vance some sacred cause, to furnish aid in time of 
need, to promote some common taste or pleasure, they 
have been prominent in almost every period of civili- 
zation. They have risen in the army, the church, the 
market-place, the professions, the occupations, the 
trades and the other departments of human activity. 
Some have survived the wreck of time and spread 
throughout the world. The Masonic fraternity traces 
its history to the days of Solomon and has branches 
today in every country. While many of these societies 
pay benefits in sickness, in misfortune and in death, 
practice charity and teach equality, they are not in- 
surance orders proper. In the insurance order the life 
of every member is insured for a definite sum payable 
at death and the possession of a policy is an essential 
condition of membership. 

The combination of fraternity with insurance was 
the culminating expression of brotherhood. Before the 
advent of this happy blending insurance was purely 
a commercial enterprise. It had become in all its forms 
the basic element in the business of the world. The 
tremendous value of life insurance as a conservator of 
society, a pillar of prosperity, a protection against pov- 
erty and want was dawning on mankind. The fact 
that it would save the dependent family from the 
consequences of the provider's death made it especially 
desirable. It was seen that if the benefits of life insur- 



136 



Fraternity and Woodcraft 



ance could be extended to the masses infinite good 
would result. The problem was solved by the appear- 
ance of the insurance order which placed insurance 
on a purely co-operative basis. The commercial 
features of profit and speculation were abolished 
and insurance was supplied at its actual cost. 
Through the lodge system and the ritual the beauties 
of fraternity were taught and through the insurance 
feature its practical blessings were enjoyed. Thus 
originated fraternal insurance. Thus fraternity brought 
insurance to the homes of toil. Thus fraternity achieved 
its highest realization. As the divine exemplar of fra- 
ternity moved principally among the masses and taught 
the universal dignity of man so fraternal insurance 
has for its single purpose the protection of the common 
people and teaches the principle of equality. 

Fraternal insurance is essentially a modern institu- 
tion. So recent has been the origin of the system 
that every order of more than a decade in age may 
justly be regarded as a pioneer. The beginnings of the 
system were necessarily crude, naturally imperfect. 
While commercial insurance had reached a stage of 
permanence the field of co-operative insurance was 
entirely new, absolutely untried. Changes and re- 
formations were found imperative as time revealed the 
errors of the past. The system has been compelled in 
face of ridicule and opposition to develop its own 
standards, to find its own course on a treacherous sea 
beneath a starless sky. And it is not going too far to 
say that few other movements in the wide reach of 
time have achieved such astounding success. The sys- 
tem was unknown in America before 1859. It has had 
but little more than a generation in which to grow. In 
fact the greater number of fraternal insurance orders 
have arisen within the last thirty years. And yet there 

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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



are over 200 orders in active operation today that have 
paid for the alleviation of poverty and pain over thir- 
teen hundred million dollars. These orders are making 
an annual distribution of over one hundred millions. 
Their combined membership approaches a total of over 
six and a half millions, nearly half the voting popu- 
lation of the United States. Adding the families and 
dependents of this membership, we may reasonably 
assert that thirty-five million American people are un- 
der the protection of the fraternal insurance system to- 
day. What a spectacle! What a record! The Amer- 
ican people are a fraternal people. The American 
masses have united to protect themselves, their families 
and their homes. With patience almost superhuman 
they have developed the co-operative system which 
brings insurance to the hosts of toil. They have taken 
from the grave much of its terror, many of its tears. 
They have lifted their loved ones from the shadow of 
pauperism and distress. They have made the fraternal 
order the sum and circle of the human virtues. They 
compose the grand army of fraternity which is moving 
forward to the peaceful conquest of the human race. 
And what an army ! History holds not its counterpart. 
Six and a half million soldiers of humanity! They 
gather about the couches of pain, the abodes of sorrow, 
the scenes of suffering and woe. They comfort the 
living and bury the dead. They attack the squadrons 
of disease and poverty. Love is the battle cry, brother- 
hood the standard. Their cause is the cause of angels, 
and their swords are swords of light. In protecting the 
home, in teaching charity, in upholding manhood and 
equality, they, the soldiers of the popular good, form 
a bulwark for the people's rights. They tread no soil 
but that of freedom, they breathe no air but that of 
liberty. They cherish the ideals of a true republic. 

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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



While they flourish free government shall endure. And 
they are doing more to maintain prosperity and con- 
serve society than all the armies, navies, parliaments 
and congresses of the world. 

Now, it is natural that fraternal orders should en- 
gage in vigorous but friendly rivalry in the promotion 
of so magnificent a cause. It is natural that the order 
which in its ritual gives happiest expression to the 
idea of brotherhood and in its plan and rates gives 
strictest study to the science of insurance, will, with 
able and consecrated management, assume the leader- 
ship. The unexampled success of the Woodmen of the 
World is due to the fact that in its symbolism, its rit- 
ual, its philosophy, its rates and plans are apparent 
the originality and inspiration of genius. The growth 
of Woodcraft suggests the story of the individual from 
the interior who was advised to go to the seashore for 
his health. It was his first visit to the sea and, in fact, 
the first time he had been very far from home. He 
had been directed to take a salt water bath twice a 
day, — morning and evening. Supposing that he had 
to bring the water from the ocean to his room he got 
a bucket the first morning and started for the sea. 
When he reached the sea he asked a policeman who 
was standing near if he could have a bucket of water. 
Seeing an opportunity for a joke the policeman told 
him that he could have the water but that he would 
have to pay him twenty-five cents for each bucket. 
He paid the money, got the water and went home. 
When he returned that evening for another bucket 
the tide had gone out nearly a quarter of a mile. "Good 
heavens," he said to the policeman, "what a big busi- 
ness you are doing !" That's the way with the Wood- 
men of the World. We are doing a big business. 

In Woodcraft the fraternal principle finds perhaps 
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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



its most appropriate illustration. The pioneers of civ- 
ilization were practical Woodmen. The colonial found- 
ers of America cleared the forest with the ax, the beetle 
and the wedge. Woodcraft accords especial honor to 
the implements of toil. It teaches the nobility of labor, 
the sublimity of self-sacrifice. It teaches that the world 
too frequently forgets the true ideals of conduct in the 
sway of fashion and the rule of gold. Woodcraft finds 
not its heroes in palaces of power, in halls of wealth. 
But in the factory where loss of life and health and 
limb are imminent and weary hands are chained to 
cheerless toil, — at the furnace where the worker con- 
fronts the molten fury of a hissing hell, his body 
scorched and blackened by the glare, breathing an at- 
mosphere of fire, crucified on a cross of flame, a mar- 
tyr of modern civilization, — in the mine where men 
face death more horrible than ever soldier dared to 
meet in battle, — in the field where broad, sun-smitten 
shoulders bend above the plow that governments may 
live and society advance, — at the workman's bench 
where labor strives with wondrous patience to sustain 
the pillars of the social structure, — in all these humble 
places where history is silent and fame is dumb Wood- 
craft proclaims its heroes, the real heroes of the world. 
Woodcraft honors all the myriads of toil. Woodcraft 
scorns mammon and worships man. The only aristoc- 
racy recognized by Woodcraft is God's aristocracy of 
honest toil. Woodcraft honors the man who earns 
his bread by the sweat of his own and not another's 
brow. The scene of our ritualistic ceremony is 
the forest, the great fraternity of nature, where oak 
and shrub, where tree and flower, where pine and plant 
dwell in harmonious brotherhood. Every member of 
our order is a Sovereign, a Sovereign who would dis- 
dain a throne, a Sovereign by virtue of no kingly 

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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



crown but by virtue of a knightly manhood. We exalt 
virtue in rags above vice in diamonds, integrity in a 
hovel above dishonor in a palace. We believe that 
men are born equal and that they die equal. To the 
democracy of life we add the equality of the grave. 
And in symbolizing this idea through the Woodmen 
monument we are instituting a practice distinctly new 
and beautiful. 

The Woodmen of the World erects a monument 
at the grave of every Sovereign whom death has sum- 
moned to the soil. From the gold and ivory of the 
Phidian Zeus to the porphyry of Napoleon's tomb 
monuments for gods and men have been erected to 
celebrate some glorious deed, some wondrous attri- 
bute. The rich and powerful have also commemorated 
their dead with gilded columns. Humbler stones have 
marked the graves of many. But never in all the ages 
that are past and among all the peoples that are gone 
has any organization, governmental or private, before 
the advent of the Woodmen of the World, recognized 
the basic truth that all men are worthy of remembrance. 
It was reserved for Perfected Woodcraft, a body of 
fraternal doctrine exemplified in the organization and 
development of the Woodmen of the World, to devise 
an unsurpassed expression of equality, a generous wid- 
ening of the sentiment of brotherly love. The Wood- 
men of the World erects a substantial monument at 
the grave of every deceased Woodman because it is a 
tenet of Woodcraft that there is something in every 
man worthy of admiration and recollection. What 
dignity for all humanity does this idea involve! How 
encouraging must it be to all men to feel that though 
the shadows of poverty and misfortune may thicken 
about them there is a great fraternal organization, the 
Woodmen of the World, extending from the forests of 

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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



Canada to the mountains of Mexico, which will rec- 
ognize and appreciate the good that is in them! And 
how deep should be the love, how everlasting the 
honor accorded the originator of this conception! In 
conceiving this and other distinctive features of our 
order the founder of Woodcraft has contributed ma- 
terially to the upbuilding of society. In originating 
the idea of the Woodmen monument the founder 
of Woodcraft, Joseph Cullen Root, must have felt 
an inspiration from the throne of God. There is no 
precedent in human history. The sole example of such 
universal honor for the sons of men is found on Gol- 
gotha's frowning brow. In Joseph Cullen Root hu- 
manity and genius have united to produce a superb 
apostle of fraternity. He wears no stars of military 
rank, he occupies no throne, but he holds an empire 
in the hearts of seven hundred and fifty thousand 
Woodmen and their dependent ones, in the affections 
of the mothers, wives and children of our dead. The 
thousands of monuments that mark the graves of de- 
parted Sovereigns are tributes more eloquent than 
saluting cannon to Joseph Cullen Root. I would rather 
have my name pronounced with his in one mother's 
prayer than with Dewey's on the lips of shouting mil- 
lions. While many would be glad to share his glory, 
few are able to appreciate and fewer still to perform 
with equal success his enormous labors. His are the 
responsibilities that produce gray hairs. 

Mention should here be made of the Sovereign 
Commander's co-worker in the formative days of 
Woodcraft, the brilliant and lamented Falkenburg. 
He planted the standards of Woodcraft in the Rocky 
Mountain and Pacific states. His efforts overtasked 
his strength and all too soon he faded from the 
walks of men. What a welcome his must have been to 

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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



the bosom of God whose fatherhood he had preached so 
eloquently on earth! He has been succeeded as Sov- 
ereign Adviser, the second highest position in the 
order, by W. A. Fraser of Texas, one of the most vig- 
orous and successful fraternalists of the age, an organ- 
izer of rarest energy and ability, a Woodman with arm 
of steel and heart of gold, whose record as manager 
of the order's organizing forces in the state of Texas 
remains unrivaled in the fraternal world. Under his 
management that state has grown from fifteen thou- 
sand to one hundred and sixty thousand members and 
is growing more rapidly every day. Time prevents 
me from speaking at length of the other Sovereign 
officers, of the genial and efficient John T. Yates of 
Nebraska without whose signature a Woodmen of 
the World certificate could hardly be recognized, a 
Sovereign of high capacity and most lovable nature ; of 
the tireless B. W. Jewell of Iowa whose work is of 
fundamental importance; of the gifted Bradshaw of 
Arkansas ; of the noble and energetic Simrall of Missis- 
sippi; of the able and watchful Maxey of Oklahoma; 
of the grand old man of Woodcraft, Farmer of Illinois ; 
of the versatile and vigilant Lewis of North Carolina; 
of the accomplished and faithful Fitzgerald of Mis- 
souri ; of the careful and capable Patterson of Tennes- 
see; of the conservative and practical Rawson of 
Ohio ; of the firm and untiring Campbell of Michigan ; 
of our able and devoted Sovereign Physicians — Cloyd 
of Missouri and Porter of Alabama; of our loyal and 
unerring General Attorney, A. H. Burnett of Nebraska. 
Woodcraft boasts another feature that ought not 
in fairness to be overlooked, a feature more prominent 
than artistic, yet thoroughly characteristic — the Wood- 
men goat. All orders have the initiatory goat but there 
is something peculiarly striking about the Woodmen 

143 



Fraternity and Woodcraft 



goat. With majestic poise and stubborn stare he con- 
fronts the trembling candidate like a dragon of old. 
He seldom misses the mark. After the collision the 
candidate finds himself unable to decide whether it 
was electricity or dynamite. A liberal application of 
the goat makes a thorough and progressive Woodman. 
He is the celebrated steed of Woodcraft and he 
ranks with the thoroughbreds of history. I know that 
Pegasus, the winged steed of Helicon, ascended from 
Medusa's blood and bore the valorous Bellerophon 
through all his struggles until the fatuous rider 
spurred him toward the gates of heaven to be flung 
by Jupiter to a fearful death. I know that Bucephalus, 
the favorite horse of Alexander, submitted to no human 
hand but that of his world-ruling master, accompanied 
him through all his wars from Hellespont to Indus to 
be buried with martial splendor on the banks of the 
Hydaspes. I know that Brilladore once carried brave 
Orlando in his knightly quests and joined his master's 
grief when the treachery of Angelica had wounded love 
and shattered reason. I know that Bayarte, steed of 
Montalvan, who captured the golden idol of Mahomet 
is lauded in the lore and minstrelsy of romantic ages. 
I know that Orelia bore the fated Roderigo, last of 
Gothic kings in Spain, in the battle wherein he lost 
his life and kingdom. I know that Rosinante, the 
famous steed of Don Quixote, charged the windmill 
on the plain of Aragon and won imperishable renown. 
I know that Dapple ambled amiably beneath the 
mountainous weight of Sancho Panza and pranced 
with pride while Sancho framed the laws for the gov- 
ernment of Barataria. I know that all these steeds and 
chargers of the past deserve the fame which history 
concedes. But above them all, in stern and silent dig- 
nity, I place the Woodmen goat. Rigid, pitiless and 

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Fraternity and Woodcraft 



inexorable, a look of sadness on his pensive brow, 
emblem of mortality and destiny, there he stands, 
waiting to stamp the principles of Woodcraft on the 
audacious anatomy of the first stranger who dares to 
enter the limits of the forest. 

Woodcraft is the shield and buckler of the masses. 
It is the fruit of liberty, the flower of fraternity. It 
provides insurance for the many. It is the shrine of 
labor, the altar of the poor. It is the foe of poverty, 
the enemy of crime. Its benefits cannot be summarized 
in words. There is no grander instrument of good than 
the Woodmen assessment. There is no other way in 
which so small a pittance may be so fruitfully em- 
ployed. On the Atlantic's restless bosom near the 
equator may be seen a group of rocks so small that 
they can hardly be detected above the surface of 
the sea. They are known as St. Paul's rocks and they 
excite at first no especial wonder. But they are the 
summit of a mountain rising from the ocean's 
bed to a height of four and one-half miles, the 
Mt. Everest of the deep. So the premium paid each 
month by every Woodman may seem small and unim- 
portant, but the contributions of seven hundred and 
fifty thousand Sovereigns constitute an avalanche of 
gold to be invested for the protection of their families 
and their homes and to earn an infinite harvest in an 
educated, devoted and progressive citizenship. 

The mission of Woodcraft may be resolved into a 
single expression, the protection of woman. The moth- 
ers of the race are the objects of its special care. They 
are the basis of the home, the support of industry, the 
crown of law, the hope of government, the diadem of 
humanity. In tenderness and grace they recall the 
classic hour when the Ionian moonlight revealed the 
new-born Venus on the wave. To speak of woman is 

145 

10 



Fraternity and Woodcraft 



to become a poet ; to love her is to assume an attribute 
of divinity. Queen of history and time she holds do- 
minion in the hearts of men. Her relation to society 
was mirrored in the sway of Juno to whom the Romans 
offered flowers and libations in the temple on the Es- 
quiline. Her influence is typified in the deeds and qual- 
ities of Pallas whom the Greeks made wisdom's god- 
dess, who taught mankind to build the ship, the chariot, 
the loom, the distaff, and the plow, who was protectress 
of municipalities and states, inventress of the war 
trumpet and the flute, patroness of manufacture, 
science, art, and guardian of the growth and health 
of men. In modern age her gentle ministration hal- 
lows earth, illumines life, adorns success and lightens 
sorrow, arouses honor and sustains ambition. Wood- 
craft in protecting woman contributes to government 
its strongest pillar, to society its surest guard, to prog- 
ress its swiftest wing, to humanity its purest jewel. 



^ 



146 



UNVEILING ORATION AT GRAVES OF 

SOVEREIGNS J. W. JONES AND 

WILSON JONES. 

WE MEET to pay the tribute of our love and 
grief to those who sleep within the voiceless 
clay, insensible alike to sunlight and to storm. 
The lightnings and the wars awake them not; they 
are the vassals of the dust. The boasted power of in- 
vention and discovery cannot reclaim them. The fa- 
bled riches of Cipango, the treasure-island fringed with 
pearls, could not secure their ransom. 

While human life pulsates we stand this side the 
boundary that man has never passed except in thought 
or dream. More easily may we track the eagle's course 
than trace the footsteps of the dead. We can not hope 
with mortal ken to penetrate eternity. 

Death has once again extended his dominion. The 
millions that for centuries have thronged his shadow- 
haunted palaces seem only to inflame his passion for 
further conquest. The most towering despot of anti- 
quity, the uncrowned monarch of an earth-embracing 
empire, found in death a land of which he could not 
say, "I came, I saw, I conquered." 

How strange the mystery of all mysteries — life! 
How stranger the tragedy of all tragedies, — death! 
Fascinating the one; repulsive the other. O, mighty 
and relentless death! Where are those who love too 
fondly to endure with patience their captivity in thine 
unknown prisons? The yearning of the soul to solve 
the problem of existence never ceases. I've stood 
beside Niagara's thunders and through the rainbows 
playing on the mist imagined that I caught a glimpse 
of God's eternal mystery. I've wandered at night along 

147 



At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

the ocean's shore and on the moonlit waters fancied 
that I saw a gleam of nature's inmost meaning. I've 
heard a world famed orchestra translate in music's uni- 
versal language the aspirations that exalt to God, and 
thought at times there sounded a solemn note, a chord 
divine, a cadence that might have risen on the lips 
of angels as they sang the secrets of the dim forever. 
I've tried with mortal view to penetrate the sky and 
dreamed I saw the shimmer of a cross and of a crown. 
But 'twas at most a fleeting vision. Amid the wreck 
of fancies and of dreams I stood abashed and baffled. 
We can unveil these monuments but we cannot unveil 
the mystery these tongueless tombs conceal. 

We are not, however, as was the Peri at the gates 
of Paradise, disconsolate. From these graves there 
rises like the dove we liberated in our burial ceremony 
the Christian's hope converting the cerements of death 
into garments of glory and flooding the future with 
light celestial. This hope is the fruitage of faith and 
love. It has sustained mankind through all the trage- 
dies of history. It has given progress and supremacy 
to the nations that have cherished it. It gilded the 
wings of the angel that proclaimed the advent of the 
Savior. It blazed from the star of Bethlehem upon 
the cradle of the world's Redeemer. It united Christ's 
disciples in a deathless brotherhood and lent them 
more than mortal power. It vitalized every parable and 
hallowed every prayer. It found illustration in Christ's 
victory in Gethsemane and radiated from his brow on 
Calvary. It animated the early Christians with undy- 
ing zeal. It taught them to welcome torture and mu- 
tilation. It conquered the Roman world. It dismantled 
the shrines and temples of the pagan gods. It banished 
Jupiter from Olympus and Neptune from the sea. With 

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At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

its advent Pluto and Charon abandoned the lower 
realms and the four rivers of that dark region ceased 
to be. 

It subdued and softened the world's barbarian mas- 
ters and its devotees kept learning and culture alive 
throughout the middle ages. It has been the precursor 
and the pillar of modern progress. It brings comfort 
to the individual as well as advancement to the world. 
It is the life-spring of every human virtue, the flood 
gate of all grief and joy. It is fairer than the rose of 
Sharon, lovelier than the lily of the valleys and sweeter 
than the song of songs which is Solomon's. It is sug- 
gested in the fragrance of every flower, the purple of 
every sunset, the majesty of every mountain. It is 
the symphony of the universe, the music of eternity. 
It sustains and strengthens man in every peril, mak- 
ing him as unmindful of the miseries and calamities 
of earth as Gibraltar of the pebbles at its base. It is 
the master of death, the conqueror of the grave. 

It is the essence of fraternity as taught in Wood- 
craft. It was embodied by the founder of our order in 
the Latin legend on these monuments, "Dum tacet, 
clamat," "though he be silent, yet he claims," though 
he be dead, yet he lives, lives in immortal spirit and 
in mortal memory to exemplify the glories of frater- 
nity and to claim from us continued allegiance to the 
obligations of Woodcraft. It is the basis of our ritual- 
istic work and finds eloquent embodiment in our burial 
and unveiling ceremonies. 

In Woodcraft may be found sublime expression 
of the principle of fraternity. What Shakespeare was 
to human life and thought is Woodcraft to frater- 
nity. The bard of Avon was peculiarly original in 
method and in form. His field was wide as history 
embracing all that rhapsodist and minstrel ever sang 

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At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

of gods and demi-gods and heroes of all times. He was 
a Homer who could find an Iliad in every struggle 
both of nations and of men — an Odyssey in every ef- 
fort of the race — a Paris, an Achilles, a Helen or a 
Hecuba in every land and period. In the fantastic 
rhythm of "The Tempest," the joy of Ariel and the 
woe of Caliban; in the fidelity of Julia, the chastity 
of Isabella, the infamy of Angelo, the buffoonery of 
Puck, the strategy of Oberon; in the perfection of 
Portia, the manliness of Orlando, the constancy of 
Rosalind, the devotion of Helena and Perdita; in the 
loyalty of Desdemona, the jealousy of Othello and the 
malignity of Iago; in the lives and destinies of Eng- 
land's orators, ministers, warriors, kings and queens, 
their deeds of glory or of shame ; in the pride of Cori- 
olanus, the influence of Volumnia, the majesty of 
Caesar; in the remorse of Macbeth, the madness of 
Lear, the nobility of Cordelia, the philosophy of Ham- 
let; in tragedy, in comedy, in sonnet and in song 
Shakespeare has clothed all human thoughts, ambi- 
tions, impulses, hopes, all actions and all aspirations in 
an eternal form preserving them for all posterity. 
Some such relation Woodcraft bears to fraternity. 

In gathering to unveil these monuments we 
celebrate a principle and glorify an institution — the 
principle of fraternity and one of the most admirable 
institutions in which that principle finds embodiment, 
the Woodmen of the World. Principles are eternal, 
institutions are perishable. It is consequently of the 
utmost importance that we should guard every benefi- 
cent institution with vigilance and devotion. Through 
the institution the principle is made of immediate value 
to mankind. If the institution dies the principle, re- 
turning to the nebula of metaphysical existence, is no 
longer useful to humanity. 

150 



At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

Observe the ponderous steam engine, a monster 
with tentacles of iron and blood of fire. The elements 
of which it is composed have existed for ages. The 
metal of which it is constructed has remained for 
centuries in the mountains and the hills. The coal 
that gives it energy and life has reposed for aeons 
beneath the forest and the valley. The steam that 
supplies its motive force has been immemorially con- 
tained in river, lake and sea. The mathematical for- 
mula governing the relation and proportion of these 
elements would have produced the same result if simi- 
larly applied two thousand years ago. If the engine 
should be destroyed these principles and elements 
would remain. The mountains and the hills, the for- 
ests, the valleys and the waters would still exist un- 
mindful of the fact that the genius of man had sum- 
moned from them a combination of material forces 
which revolutionized the progress of the world. The 
disappearance of the engine would mean general 
retrogression. Yet not a single element or principle 
of its composition would be destroyed. The steam en- 
gine is one of the physical institutions underlying the 
commercial advancement of modern times. Thus we 
see the importance of preserving the institution. 

Observe the republic of the United States. It is an 
institution embodying the principle of liberty. Yet 
liberty has been known and dreamed and sung since 
language formed on human lips and aspirations strug- 
gled in the hearts of men. If this republic should per- 
ish who will say that the principle of liberty would not 
still live although it may have departed from our 
government? If the blessings of liberty are to be 
enjoyed by contemporary generations and to be pre- 
served for posterity the constitution and the law, the 
frame-work of the republic, the basis of the institu- 

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At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

tional structure of American liberty, must be defended 
and upheld. 

Observe the Woodmen of the World, the organiza- 
tion in whose name we assemble today. It is an insti- 
tution expressive of the highest conception of human 
welfare, the embodiment of the principle of fraternity. 
It illustrates the most practical phase fraternity has 
yet assumed. The destruction of this order and of the 
other fraternal insurance institutions would not an- 
nihilate the principle of fraternity but would effectu- 
ally remove it from active operation in the affairs of 
men. It would be difficult to imagine a calamity more 
profound. It is well, therefore, that we should gather 
today to renew allegiance to the institution in order 
that we may retain the principle. It is well, therefore, 
that we should here resolve to exert every effort to 
maintain the integrity and facilitate the growth of the 
Woodmen of the World in order that the principle of 
fraternity may continue to illuminate the pathway of 
the toiling millions. Woodcraft is not for the few, but 
for the many. It is not of or for the "Four Hundred," 
it is of and for the ninety millions of the American 
people. 

It is proper that we should worship the principle 
but it is imperative that we should foster the institu- 
tion. Without the institution the principle is useless. 
Without the organization the principle remains an 
abstraction, beautiful to describe, useless to employ. 
It matters not how eloquently we may speak of the 
glories of religion if at the same time we contribute 
nothing to the support of the church. It avails little 
how loudly a man may praise the work and aim of 
Woodcraft if he does not become a Woodman or, if 
already a Woodman, he fails to attend its ceremonies, 
to evince an interest in its progress and to pay his 

152 



At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

assessments and dues with cheerfulness and prompti- 
tude. 

The fraternal insurance order is practically a new 
force in the world. Its object is to place life insurance 
within the reach of the masses. Men have ceased to 
deny the value of insurance. Insurance is the basis of 
modern commerce and trade. In its various forms it 
enters into almost every commercial transaction. It 
is an element in the price of practically every com- 
modity. Men saw that certain calamities and perils 
were inseparable from every human undertaking. They 
knew that among those engaged in every occupa- 
tion disaster would fall on a fated few. They 
saw that the contribution of a comparatively insigni- 
ficant sum by each to a common fund would repay 
these inevitable losses. By the experience of the past 
they were enabled to calculate with approximate cer- 
tainty the amount of the contribution required. Thus 
insurance began and it has given to industry, to trade 
and to civilization a security which could not have 
been otherwise obtained. It is the challenge of man 
to accident and fortune. It is the defiance the modern 
Titans of business and finance fling to the lightning 
and the storm. It is the fortress that shields humanity 
from the treachery of nature. It is the endeavor to 
eliminate chance, to give certainty and confidence to 
human ventures and occupations. Without it the tre- 
mendous fabric of existing industry would dissolve. 
It is the guardian of the ship on the sea, the home on 
the shore. It holds out to every man the promise of 
definite recompense for his labor and his talent, the 
guarantee that if injured by causes he could not pre- 
figure or control he shall be made whole again so far 
as these extraneous catastrophes are concerned. Be- 
fore the advent of insurance against death and fire and 

153 



At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

storm human enterprise was timid, narrow, unprogres- 
sive and constrained. Insurance liberated the modern 
spirit of commerce and pillared the arch on which the 
mighty development of the time is based. 

It is a remarkable fact that life insurance has cor- 
responded in the rapidity of its development with the 
growth of freedom in human government. There is a 
significant relation between liberty and life insurance. 
As long as tyranny overshadowed the world, debasing 
the minds and darkening the souls of men, an individual 
life was not deemed of measurable value. When the 
stolid gaze of laborer and serf was lifted from the soil 
and fixed on freedom's holy light, when the aspira- 
tions of liberty burst like the harmony of the spheres 
upon the awakening consciences of men, every brow 
became a throne of dignity and hope, the humblest 
home a palace of freedom and love. It was then that 
the individual life assumed such value and such sig- 
nificance that life insurance became a permanent ele- 
ment in civilization. 

Before the advent of the fraternal insurance order 
life insurance was controlled exclusively by corpora- 
tions and stock companies whose primary object was 
profit. They represent what is popularly known as 
the old line, or commercial, phase of life insurance. 
They find in the business they have developed with 
life insurance as its basis a source of tremendous gain. 
They have almost ceased to deal in pure life insurance. 
They emphasize today the benefit they confer upon 
the policyholder himself rather than upon his family. 
They hold out to the policyholder opportunities for 
enriching himself, appealing more to the motive of 
personal gain than to the unselfish sentiment of the 
protection of his home. Now, what is the func- 
tion of fraternal insurance, the insurance of Wood- 

154 



At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

craft? It is the distribution of life insurance among 
the masses of the people at as near actual cost as 
practicable. It has no owners, stockholders or pro- 
moters. It promises no dividends, loans or cash re- 
turns. Its object is not to enrich the man who holds 
the policy but to protect his family and preserve his 
home. 

The Woodmen monument around which we now 
assemble is an emblem of the Woodman's faith. The 
Woodman's axe is a truer type of usefulness than an 
emperor's diadem. We believe in the dignity of labor, 
the majesty of toil. We believe there is no aristo- 
cracy but that of honor, no rabble but that of crime. 
We believe the paltry distinctions of wealth and rank 
and title should be discarded and that men should be 
measured by manhood, not by money. We believe the 
head that wears the workman's paper cap is far more 
sacred than the head that wears the monarch's crown. 
We believe the hand that wields the saw, the axe, the 
spade is far more valuable to humanity than the hand 
that wields the scepter or the sword. Following the 
doctrines of Woodcraft I would rather wear rags with 
honor than fine linen with corruption. Knowing that 
Woodcraft honors man, not mammon, I would rather 
be buried with its simple ceremonies than with all the 
pomp of earth. I would rather have a Woodmen monu- 
ment above my inanimate clay than a mausoleum of 
marble and gold. And the families of the Sovereigns 
around whose tombs we stand today may recognize in 
the Woodmen monuments above the ashes of their 
beloved a symbol of the fact that the Woodmen of 
the World protects the living and honors the dead. 

We are here today to unveil the monuments at the 
graves of Sovereigns J. W. Jones and Wilson Jones. 
Sovereign J. W. Jones was born in 1859 in the state 

155 



At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

of North Carolina. He came to Texas in 1880 but soon 
returned to his native home to seek the empress of 
his dreams. He was successful in his knightly quest 
and came again to Texas to remain until his dust 
should mingle with that of this imperial state. His 
generous nature, his industry and business capacity 
so favorably impressed the people of Bowie County 
that they elected him to one of the most responsible 
county offices. He continued in office until his un- 
timely death at the age of thirty-nine. He was liberal, 
generous and true. 

Sovereign Wilson Jones was born in South Caro- 
lina in 1845. He entered the confederate service at the 
age of fifteen and served with honor during the entire 
four years of that historic strife, having been wounded 
twice. My friends, the confederate soldier is one of 
the heroic figures of human history. He had no supe- 
rior in valor. When his fortunes fell before as mighty 
odds as soldier ever faced he faltered not. With cour- 
age unsurpassed he gathered his battle-worn rags 
about him and rose to heights but little lower than 
divine. Sovereign Wilson Jones returned home from 
the war* and took up the plain but honorable occupa- 
tion of village smith. He was universally esteemed 
and revered. Healthy, robust and strong, he exem- 
plified the character immortalized by Longfellow in the 
poem which begins: 

"Under a spreading chestnut tree 
The village smithy stands." 

The Sovereigns whose monuments we unveil today 
carried through the wars of life the banners of a spot- 
less manhood. They appreciated their manifold rela- 
tions to family, church and state and performed with 
commendable diligence the duties of the spheres in 
which they moved. They translated into their daily 

156 



At the Graves of J. W. and Wilson Jones 

lives the principles of Woodcraft. Both were prac- 
tical and far-seeing. Both leave large families to whom 
the legacy of a Woodmen of the World certificate is 
doubly precious. Both had the infinite satisfaction 
of feeling that on their buried heads would never 
fall the reproaches of neglected love. Both were 
faithful Christians and faithful Woodmen. And now 
may the power that "hardens the ruby in a million 
years while Alps and Andes come and go like rain- 
bows," the power that "stilleth the noise of the seas, 
the noise of their waves and the tumult of the people," 
receive into eternal happiness the Sovereigns whose 
tombs we dedicate today. 



& 



157 



WOODCRAFT AND THE FRATERNAL 
INSURANCE SYSTEM. 

DELIVERED ON WOODMEN OF THE WORLD DAY, 
CHARLESTON EXPOSITION. 

EXPOSITIONS mark the progress of humanity. 
They reflect the advancement of the centuries 
and picture the achievements of man. They 
gather in harmonious display all the triumphs of in- 
vention, science, art and learning and give new hope 
and new horizons to the world. 

The palaces of architectural grace and splendor 
composing the present exposition and rising like 
visions of glory from these enchanted shores are an 
appropriate tribute to the genius of the race. No state 
could have formed a more fitting stage, no city a more 
perfect environment for such an enterprise than the 
state of South Carolina and the city of Charleston. 

Sacrifice, constancy and valor have found within 
the state of South Carolina an intense expression. Its 
past is an epic combining victories of statesmanship 
and arms with mighty sorrows. What tragedies, what 
glories and what woes that past reveals ! We hear the 
music of the axes as they play upon the pines and we 
see the first English settlement rising on the Ashley. 
A century passes ! We see the American colonies rest- 
less beneath oppression. We hear the voice of Gads- 
den ring through South Carolina like a trumpet-call. 
He proclaims the cause of all America. We see revo- 
lution pour across this state a tide of flame. We see 
Laurens at the head of the Continental Congress 
and later a captive in the London tower. V/e see 
the campaigns of Marion, Sumter, Pickens and their 

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Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

heroic followers. We see Rutledge and the Pinckneys 
in the Constitutional Convention of 1787, the very 
words of the younger Pinckney becoming part of the 
most significant written instrument in political annals. 
We see Langdon Cheves in the American Congress 
recalling to Irving's fancy the immortal orators of 
classic times. We hear the notes of Hugh Legare 
and Robert Hayne. We see the stern, patrician figure 
of Calhoun. We hear him measure argument with 
Webster and Clay defining the rights of state and 
nation. We see the shadows of civil war. The first 
sword to defend the Southern cause is the sword of 
South Carolina. We see a period wherein the people 
of this state exhibit the noblest devotion, the highest 
courage of which humanity is capable. Then we see 
South Carolina rise from the ruins of cities, fields and 
firesides. And today we behold its energies reach their 
throne and crown and flower in an era of fraternal 
peace symbolized by this exposition. 

I repeat that this state and city compose an appro- 
priate scene for an exposition devoted to the portrayal 
of enterprise and progress. It is equally proper that a 
day should have been set apart by the management 
for the Woodmen of the World, an organization rep- 
resenting one of the most useful and benevolent phases 
of human effort. In fact this exposition would have 
been incomplete had it failed to recognize the tre- 
mendous economic movement typified in the Wood- 
men of the World. The world at large has not under- 
stood as yet the significance of this movement. This 
exposition will have materially contributed to the wel- 
fare of mankind if it shall increase the prominence and 
popularity of such an institution as the Woodmen of 
the World. 

Sovereigns of Woodcraft, we are assembled in the 
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Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

name of a sacred cause. We are gathered to pay tribute 
to a great principle. It is an inspiring occasion, a holy 
theme. The banners of brotherhood are above us ; the 
impulse of fraternity is within us. In meeting here 
we are taking part in the movement that is reclaiming 
humanity from poverty and tears. We are standing 
among the watch-fires of civilization; we are bat- 
tling with the shadow and the night. We represent 
one of the most beneficent phases of human progress, — 
the system whose principal object is the protection of 
the mother, the wife, the child, a trinity composing 
the base and pillar of society, a triple inspiration of 
grandeur, loveliness and purity that should prompt 
mankind to greater effort than love of empire or of 
gold. 

The noblest form that human endeavor has yet 
assumed is the system in behalf of which we have 
assembled, — the system of fraternal insurance. It is 
the result of a great historic impulse, an impulse so 
general and so enthusiastic that it could have no other 
origin than the intuitive desire of the people to im- 
prove economic conditions. It rests on deathless prin- 
ciples, the principles of brotherhood and equality. It 
is the most powerful weapon with which the people 
may resist the commercial despotisms of the time. 
In fact it is a combination of the people to protect 
the liberties and secure the welfare of themselves and 
their posterity. 

There is no subject concerning which more mis- 
representation exists than the subject of fraternal in- 
surance. It has encountered opposition and criticism 
from the old line insurance companies, the most power- 
ful financial forces of the age. It has caught upon its 
spotless shield the poisoned arrows of prejudice and 
slander. But despite these obstacles it has become a 

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Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

permanent and growing factor in the industrial life 
of the country. The wonderful growth of fraternal 
insurance in the United States gives the lie to calumny 
and makes the system worthy of confidence and sup- 
port. 

In presenting the advantages of the fraternal sys- 
tem it is unnecessary to dwell upon the technical sub- 
ject of life insurance. The benefits and functions of 
life insurance are so widely understood that an at- 
tempt to demonstrate them would be a waste of words 
and time. The superstitious dread with which life 
insurance was once regarded has practically passed 
away. It has become as common for men of sense and 
judgment to insure their lives as to insure their houses, 
barns and other material possessions. Men have come 
to realize that insurance against death is as essential 
a part of their business capital as is insurance against 
fire. Men no longer think more of their barns than of 
their lives. The man who earns two thousand dollars 
annually has in his life and energy the equivalent of 
a capital of forty thousand dollars. The amount earned 
is the interest on the capital of brain and heart and 
arm. It is certain that at some time this capital will 
be destroyed, that the brain will cease to think, the 
heart to beat, the arm to strike, and that this income 
will consequently fail. A man's barn and residence 
may never burn; but he must die and possibly burn 
also. Considerations both of prudence and affection 
unite in commanding him to take the steps by which 
some portion of that capital may be replaced when 
its inevitable destruction shall have occurred. 

The nature and importance of life insurance are 
almost universally conceded. It is the fraternal sys- 
tem of life insurance that is not so well understood 
by the general public although it is growing in pop- 

161 

u 



Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

ularity and favor at an almost incredible rate. This 
system is of comparatively recent development. At 
the close of the American civil war there was prob- 
ably not more than one insurance order in the United 
States. The old line companies, with decades of expe- 
rience behind them, monopolized the field. What 
necessity existed for the fraternal system? What 
prompted Joseph Cullen Root in 1890 to found the 
Woodmen of the World? 

The object of the founders and apostles of the fra- 
ternal system was to place life insurance on a co-opera- 
tive, non-commercial basis and thereby to extend its 
blessings to the struggling masses. The old line com- 
panies threatened then, as with a thousand times more 
emphasis they threaten now, to destroy the proper 
province of insurance by obscuring it in the glittering 
mazes of investment and speculation. Fraternalists 
have felt and feel today that the central purpose of 
insurance is the protection of the family and the home 
when the protector shall have died. We hold that any 
inducement which diverts attention from this purpose 
and directs it to the personal interest of the policy- 
holder himself is dangerous. We hold that for the sake 
of his wife and child it ought to be beyond a man's 
power to cash his policy. We hold that surrender 
values, loans and cash returns tempt a man to look 
upon his insurance as for his own benefit rather than 
the benefit of his family. It would require the genius 
of Dante, the grim artist of hell, to depict the horrors 
that beset the man who in some financial crisis yields 
to the temptation of a cash surrender, sells his old 
line policy and finds it impossible to obtain further 
insurance. We hold that there are sad prospects for 
the family when a man has insurance which he knows 
is a merchantable commodity. We hold that human 

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Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

nature is all too frail to withstand the temptations and 
misfortunes which may confront that man. We say 
that speculation and debt are encouraged by the fact 
that the old line insurance policy may be pawned and 
traded. We say that insurance ought not to be a 
negotiable commodity but a sacred obligation cashable 
only when the policyholder dies. We say that life 
insurance is essentially for others, — not for self. 

We have no war to make upon the principle of in- 
vestment. We commend the speculative policy of the 
old line company to the man who is financially able 
to carry it and who will agree in addition to take out 
a policy cashable only by his family at his death. But 
we say that investment is foreign to insurance. We 
say that the element of investment increases the price 
of insurance to such an extent that the laboring man 
cannot purchase it. The companies do not insist upon 
a policy of pure life insurance. There is not enough 
money in it. They are for money; we are for men. 
They add the element of investment, suggesting en- 
dowments, loans, surrenders and returns, all of which 
are antagonistic to the true spirit of insurance. 

The popular revolt against the old line system 
bears some resemblance to the American revolution 
against Great Britain. The government of that country 
was being conducted on the principles of most of 
the old line companies. The president was the king 
with an enormous salary and the directors ran things 
to suit themselves. They altered the tax basis, wasted 
the surplus and allowed the colonial policyholders no 
voice in the management. The colonists lapsed, cashed 
the surrender values of their English policies at York- 
town, organized the self-governing fraternity of the 
United States of America and made liberty the per- 
manent password. 

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Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

The province of fraternal insurance was vividly 
exemplified by the martyred president, William Mc- 
Kinley, in an address before a convention of old line 
insurance men during his second term as governor 
of Ohio. He congratulated them upon the work they 
were performing for the world. He expressed his admi- 
ration for their tireless energies and vast accumula- 
tions. And then a sentence left his lips which embodied 
the foundation and the philosophy of the fraternal sys- 
tem. "But what," he said, "are you doing for the com- 
mon people? You point with justifiable pride to your 
great achievements, your millions of reserve, to your 
magnificent buildings and the almost limitless treasure 
that has been skillfully disbursed to the betterment of 
thousands, but what of the humble toiler, his widow, 
and his orphan?" Such were the words of one of 
America's foremost statesmen. He was an apostle of 
equality. He did much to reunite the American people 
and to fraternalize the American republic. He was 
too great to hate. He rose above the prejudices of 
his time. He illustrated the holiness of sympathy, 
the sublimity of tolerance. Forgetting partisanship 
let us pause to mourn and praise him. The memory 
of his gentle dignity, his spotless character in which 
the elements of fraternity and nobility shone brightest 
against the gathering shadows of eternity will receive 
the laurels and the tears of coming ages. His death 
had a fraternal significance. For while the blood the 
soldiers of the North and South poured out in common 
in behalf of Cuban liberty did much to erase the en- 
mities of the past the American people were more last- 
ingly united by the tears they shed together at William 
McKinley's grave. His address before the convention 
of old line disciples, his solicitude for the widows and 

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Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

orphans of the people indicated his strong belief in 
insurance for the masses. 

But the advantages of insurance for the masses 
through self-governing, non-profit organizations, in- 
finite as they are, compose by no means the only 
beneficent characteristics of the fraternal system. 
There is yet another characteristic above and below 
all these, above them a star, below them a pillar, — a 
characteristic without which the success of the sys- 
tem is impossible, with which its triumphs in the 
past have been won and its victories in the future 
are assured, — the characteristic of fraternity. Many 
beneficent movements may be traced to the influ- 
ence of fraternity. Fraternity is Christ embodied 
in a sentiment, clothed in a principle. He expressed 
the idea of fraternity when he said, "Bear ye one 
another's burdens," one of the sublimest sentences 
in writ divine. His life and crucifixion form the su- 
preme fraternal example of the ages. If a God became 
the associate and equal of the humblest . toiler cer- 
tainly no man can arrogate right or nature superior 
to his fellow-men. His example hastened the advent 
of liberty. And fraternity, — Christ speaking through 
an idea, — has remained the watchword and the signal 
of human progress. The American republic is frater- 
nity applied to government. The fraternal order is 
fraternity applied to insurance. Fraternity suggested 
the rescue of life insurance from the hands of those 
who were making it an instrument of selfish gain. 
Fraternity suggested that the mother, the wife, the 
child could be best protected by the removal of insur- 
ance from the field of speculation and investment. 
Fraternity suggested that the common people gather 
beneath its wings to secure at cost protection for their 
homes. 

165 



Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

It will thus be seen that the fraternal system had 
its origin in the most laudable and inspiring motives. 
The assertion will not be denied that its underlying 
purposes are pure. Its progress is an astonishing 
tribute to its integrity and permanence. It has 
succeeded in bringing insurance within the reach of 
the masses because it has avoided the elements of 
investment, profit, and large expense. Being a rep- 
resentative system dealing in insurance proper it has 
been freed from the burdens of tremendous salaries, 
gain for owners, promoters, stockholders and directors, 
heavy commissions, numberless agents, additional 
charges for speculative features, all of which swell the 
expense account of the companies to an enormous 
extent. Enthusiasm of membership is its chief organ- 
izing agency and costs it nothing. 

So far as the actual cost of insurance is concerned 
the charge in the order and the company should be 
exactly the same. The laws of mortality govern the 
actual cost of insurance with unerring and universal 
precision. The difference between the systems lies 
in the expense account and the investment feature. 
The two systems begin side by side. The charge for 
insurance proper must be the same in each. But when 
the mile-post of mortality is passed they diverge. The 
fraternity has a small additional charge for expense 
of management and relies upon the devotion of its 
members to make it a success. The company adds a 
charge for investment and for an expense so enormous 
that its premium is beyond the means of the masses 
and depends upon its cash to keep its high-priced 
agencies in the field. The claim that the companies 
are driving the fraternals out of popular favor is ab- 
surd. They are catching us in the same way a man 
in northeast Texas caught a bear. He had been in- 

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Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

vited to join a bear hunt but refused to stay with 
his companions boasting that he preferred to hunt 
that kind of game alone. He wandered away from the 
company and came suddenly upon a huge bear. He 
turned instantly and made for camp with the bear in 
close and exciting pursuit. When he came within 
sight of camp he could feel the breath of the bear 
upon his flying form. One of his friends cried from 
the camp: "Why don't you shoot him? Why don't 
you shoot him?" "Shoot, you fool," he yelled, as he 
increased his speed, "don't you see I'm bringing him 
home alive?" 

The members of the true fraternal order are united 
by the ties of brotherhood. They assert an active, per- 
sonal interest in the order's welfare. It is natural and 
necessary that they should do so because they are an 
essential part of its very being. They own the insti- 
tution. It is of the people, for the people and by 
the people. They visit the sick, assist the needy and 
bury the dead. They do not confine their efforts to 
the mere payment of dues. This is but half the fra- 
ternal obligation. The member-for-insurance-only is 
an imposition. The active members are carrying at 
least half of his insurance. The fraternal assessment 
is payable half in enthusiasm and half in cash. En- 
thusiasm alone makes insurance at cost possible. The 
Woodmen of the World lost some thirty members in 
the Galveston storm. When the policies of these un- 
fortunate Sovereigns were paid did Woodmen consider 
that their fraternal obligations had been discharged? 
No! Before the echoes of the storm had died a rep- 
resentative of the Woodmen of the World, our de- 
voted Fraser, was first to enter Galveston with relief 
funds. The Woodmen of the World sent in free-will 
contributions from its individual members over fifteen 

167 



Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

thousand dollars to be distributed among flood-stricken 
Sovereigns. In Ellis County, Texas, the members 
of a Woodmen Camp harvested the cotton crop 
of a sick brother. In Texarkana the child of an 
humble Woodman died and afterward the father 
said that but for the Woodmen at the burial there 
would have been hardly a sufficient number present 
to lower the casket. These incidents might be multi- 
plied indefinitely. They show the source of fraternal 
success. It is through such services that devotion to 
the order is aroused and the necessary enthusiasm 
created. These things make it possible to preserve the 
fraternal system. Enthusiasm takes the place of accu- 
mulation and the order flourishes through the magic 
influence of fraternal love, an influence the old line 
company can never invoke. Enthusiasm supplies for 
the order the expense element which the company must 
add in cash in order to defray the enormous cost of 
agencies, and the other elements to which allusion has 
been made. The local camp is the principal agency of 
fraternalism, the center of enthusiasm. And this sav- 
ing would exist in favor of the fraternal order should 
the companies confine themselves to insurance proper 
and omit the investment proposition entirely. Oh, that 
every member of every legitimate order would keep 
religiously in mind the fact that the very life of the 
fraternal system with its vast possibilities for good 
depends upon the interest and enthusiasm which he 
as an individual exhibits in its behalf ! 

The development of the fraternal system has not 
been unattended by difficulty or disaster. I do not 
desire to conceal the fact that the system began with 
an absolutely erroneous mortality basis. The laws of 
mortality were disregarded because they were not 
understood. Excessive cheapness seemed to be the 

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Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

rule in the early days of the older orders, and this 
error has not today been eliminated from the rate- 
tables of some orders. These orders that still attempt 
to exist without an emergency fund, on a mere current 
rate basis, calling less than twelve assessments a year, 
and fondly imagining that they can do so permanently, 
bring to mind the story of the man in New Orleans 
who received a telegram announcing the death of his 
brother in New York. The telegram contained an in- 
quiry as to what disposition should be made of the 
body, stating that they could "freeze him for fifty dol- 
lars or embalm him for one hundred dollars." The 
grief -stricken brother wired back: "Freeze him from 
his knees up for forty dollars; his feet were frozen 
last winter." 

It is a fact that in the beginning the rates of the 
orders were almost without exception insufficient to 
meet the actual mortality cost of insurance. The 
founders of fraternalism were neither mathematicians 
nor insurance experts. They were lovers of mankind 
who felt with the instinctiveness of a genuine humani- 
ty that infinite benefit would result from the applica- 
tion of fraternity to insurance. They knew that insur- 
ance ought to be brought to the masses, but in the 
plans they at first adopted they did not appreciate the 
importance of mortality. But does any blame attach 
to them or the system for this? Is Fulton condemned 
because he did not produce a modern steamer? Are 
Watt and Worcester and the other fashioners of the 
first crude engines the less praised because they did 
not give the world a twentieth century fast express? 
On the contrary are not these men honored all the 
more as their rude contrivances are made more useful 
and more perfect by time and thought and trial? Fra- 
ternal insurance has barely left the primary period 

169 



Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

of its existence. Like every other human enterprise 
it has met discouragement and in some instances fail- 
ure. But it has permitted nothing to deter its progress. 
It has profited by every mistake. It has built stand- 
ards out of its own experience. It has resolutely adopt- 
ed the necessary modifications and changes, and it is 
today a permanence in history. Fraternal orders have 
failed. So have national banks. It is as absurd to use 
the failure of a national bank as an argument against 
the stability of the national banking system as it 
is to argue the frailty of the fraternal scheme from 
the collapse of a particular order. Old line companies 
have failed. If the Home Forum and the Chosen 
Friends are cited as evidences against the fraternal 
system, we point to the Commercial Alliance Life, the 
People's Life, and the American Union Life, all old 
line companies that have failed within the past two 
decades. And we point to the further fact that out of 
forty-one New York state companies in existence in 
1870 only fourteen remained in 1900. Fraternal insur- 
ance is on the whole a wonderful success. 

The utmost harmony among the orders themselves 
is essential to continued progress. Co-operation among 
the orders is as necessary to make the system vic- 
torious as is co-operation among the individual mem- 
bers of the various orders to make the individual orders 
triumphant. They have the same battles to fight, the 
same enemies to overcome. 

The individual order will be successful insofar as 
it embodies the vital principles of the fraternal system. 
The fact that the Woodmen of the World has happily 
combined these principles in its plans and features is 
the explanation of its magnificent growth. The Wood- 
men of the World has met the problems of fraternal- 
ism with fearlessness and intelligence. It has evolved 

170 



Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

a plan which makes it the most conservative, the most 
enlightened and the most promising force in the fra- 
ternal field. In the beginning it committed the errors 
common to the system at the time. But owing to its 
thoroughly representative government, its original and 
striking characteristics, and above all, its faithful, 
progressive membership, it has always faced the truth 
and adopted without hesitation the teachings of expe- 
rience and reason. No other order has so rapidly 
approached the solution of the fraternal mortality 
problem and with so little disturbance. The member-* 
ship has conducted and controlled its destinies. There 
is an attractiveness about this order which wins pop- 
ular confidence and love. All its success is due to the 
fact that it provides the fraternal principle with com- 
plete and glorious illustration. The name itself is 
suggestive of brotherhood. The word "Woodmen" is 
indicative of the common people, of frugality, equality 
and toil. The implements of Woodcraft, the axe, the 
beetle and the wedge, are the primary and indispensa- 
ble implements of civilization. In addition to the em- 
bodiment of these ideas in a beautiful ritual, Wood- 
craft possesses a feature which is one of the most 
impressive symbols of fraternity under God, — the 
Woodmen monument. 

At the grave of every Woodman a stately monu- 
ment is erected. Whether in life our departed Sover- 
eigns occupied the cabins of the poor or the palaces 
of the proud, the spheres of the humble or the seats 
of the mighty, the places of the weak or the citadels 
of the strong, the Woodmen monument rises in equal 
dignity above them. It commemorates the forethought 
they exercised in the protection of the home. The man 
who has such a distinction has not lived in vain. The 
man who sleeps beneath the Woodmen monument has 

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Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

discharged the most sacred obligations of humanity. 
It is a tribute to the purity of his love, the usefulness 
of his life. It is a glory within the reach of men 
of every rank and station. It signalizes the equality 
of men before the law of Woodcraft and the bar of 
God. It honors men regardless of wealth and place 
and fame. Thousands of Christians lie in unmarked 
graves. Thousands of Masons rest in desolated crypts. 
Thousands of others, high and low, emperors, kings, 
scholars, writers, patriots repose in neglected or for- 
gotten sepulchers. But every Woodman knows that 
his memory will be affectionately cherished with mar- 
ble eloquence, or granite praise. In distant Germany, 
at Arzberg, Bavaria, a Woodmen monument rises 
above the tomb of a Sovereign who went back to the 
fatherland to die. 

The world is now applauding the man it calls the 
hero of Santiago, — the man who stood like an angel 
of war on the Brooklyn's bridge. The world does 
well to extend him honor. But deep within the bosom 
of that battleship men stood against the heat and glare 
of the volcanic fires that propelled it. Below the 
ocean's restless sweep, ignorant of the fortunes of the 
battle, not knowing whether the next moment would 
find them conquerors or captives, or whether shot or 
accident would send the engulfing tide upon their help- 
less lives, they bent their scorched and blackened 
bodies to the nurture of the flame. The world does 
not know their names, but these men are the real 
heroes of Santiago. And the Woodmen of the World 
would erect a monument to them as gladly as to the 
famous man upon the bridge. 

A review of the features and the growth of the 
Woodmen of the World suggests the thought that its 
founder, Joseph Cullen Root, must have felt the in- 

172 



Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

spiration of genius, the promptings of a sweet human- 
ity. When Joseph Cullen Root gave Woodcraft and the 
Woodmen monument to the world he became one of 
the great benefactors of the human race. He founded an 
institution that has expended millions in monuments 
and death claims. Every dollar of this vast amount 
has been a star in the midnight of some widow's dis- 
tress, some orphan's despair. Think of the children 
this sum has educated, the poverty it has relieved! 
Think of the lives that have been turned from pauper- 
ism, wreck and shame by the institution which flow- 
ered from this man's brain ! I would rather be Joseph 
Cullen Root and take to the throne of God one widow's 
prayer than to be Napoleon accompanied to judgment 
by the thunders of Austerlitz and Wagram! If the 
angels of doom should visit earth today to select the 
men most useful to mankind they would pass emper- 
ors, kings and presidents and lay their laurels at the 
feet of such men as Joseph Cullen Root. 

Woodcraft is the poetry of fraternity. It uplifts 
the common people. In uplifting the masses it elevates 
society. It has its origin in that sublime and incorrupt- 
ible sense of justice which throughout history and time 
has found its throne and temple among the masses of 
the people. In protecting woman and the home it 
refreshes, purifies, strengthens the foundations of social 
order. 

The reverence of woman is the supreme mark of 
civilization. The world was ever happiest when woman 
was most free. The destinies of nations lie in her con- 
trol, for the whispers of the mother become the thun- 
ders of the law. And the American woman is earth's 
highest type of loveliness and perfection. Tell me not of 
Cleopatra, whose resistless charm made warriors 
desert the battlefield and priests forsake the temple. 

173 



Woodcraft and Fraternal Insurance 

Tell me not of Agrippina, whose ambition made 
emperors tremble, nor of Margaret, the Semiramis 
of the north, who preserved her shattered country 
through the union of Calmar. Tell me not of Joan of 
Arc, Domremy's tender maid, whose girlish figure 
looming near the lilies in the red front of the battle 
led France to victory. Tell me not of Isabella, whose 
aid made possible the most tremendous event in 
human history — the discovery of America — nor of 
Anne, whose reign the valorous Churchill made 
illustrious. Tell me not of Elizabeth, whose 
name forever signalizes the most brilliant period 
of English literature and adventure, nor of Victoria, 
whose long career comprised the earth's greatest ma- 
terial development and whose imperial star declining 
threw a baleful light across the South African sky. Sing 
not to me of these, for above them all, on a throne of 
fadeless splendor, I place the American woman whose 
empire is the American home. 



^ 



174 



THE PROGRESS OF FRATERNALISM. 

THE story of the world is a story of progress. The 
song that ripples on the lips of Clio, muse of his- 
tory, is a song that sounds an eternal charge. 
With purpose changeless and inexorable, with courage 
stern and unrelenting, humanity ascends the steep 
of time. Unsubverted by ages of violence, unde- 
stroyed by movements of retrogressive tendency, 
through pestilence and carnage, through famine and 
flame, through flood and blood, civilization sweeps to- 
ward God. The swift-winged centuries have borne 
mankind through storms and fires of ceaseless change. 
Ignorance and superstition, oppression and corrup- 
tion, anarchy, fanaticism and invasion have failed to 
stay the onward stride of man. The advancement of 
the ages culminated during the eighteenth century in 
the complete awakening of the human race. Revolu- 
tion translated the principles of liberty and equality 
into permanent institutions. The light of freedom 
blazed upon the world and, like the star that nineteen 
hundred years ago illuminated the cradle of a god, 
revealed to modern times the accomplishment of the 
basic tenet of that god's gospel, the advent of individual 
liberty. 

The establishment of liberty was an illustration of 
the power of fraternity, a principle that had found ex- 
pression in the teachings of divinity. The new com- 
mandment to love each other, the tender charge to 
carry one another's burdens, the description of the final 
judgment in which the least of human kind is made 
an object of equal consideration with Christ, all gave 
utterance and impulse to the idea of brotherhood 
which is destined to transform the world. It was fra- 

175 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



ternity that inspired the drooping energies of men in 
the long conflict for the supremacy of right. It was 
fraternity that implanted the desire for equality in 
the human heart. It was fraternity that struck the 
shackles from the brain and enabled the liberated mind 
to wrest the thunderbolt from the storm. 

Fraternity is the basis of society, because society is 
founded upon the principle that men must dwell to- 
gether in unity and peace. For centuries fraternity has 
lingered like an angel on the horizon, inspiring every 
struggle for freedom, every prayer for truth. Frater- 
nity is the chief source of liberty, the fountain from 
which light has streamed upon the pathway of the ages. 
No sweeter strain has ever trembled on the lyre of Or- 
pheus or the harp of David than that which fraternity 
awakens in the souls of men. When the Declaration of 
Independence issued from the brain and pen of Jeffer- 
son fraternity became a fundamental factor in Ameri- 
can history. 

On the eve of the new year of 1898 I witnessed the 
birth of Greater New York, the largest city of the 
western world. As midnight closed the gates of time 
upon the departed year the flag of the greater city, im- 
pelled by the mysterious current that had been set in 
motion on the Pacific coast but an instant before, 
slowly and gracefully unfurled. It was a memorable 
event — a remarkable scene. There were aerial Ni- 
agaras of fire; there were bursts of music, shouts of 
enthusiasm and songs of praise. The thunders of ar- 
tillery blended in the chorus that saluted the birth 
of the proudest city of a continent. Impressed with 
the meaning and the majesty of the occasion, I 
thought of my country's wondrous history. I thought 
of the splendors of peace, of the triumphs of war, of 
the progress in art, in material achievement, in virtue 

176 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



and in honor. I thought of the blessings of liberty. 
And as I saw in this glittering carnival a symbol of it 
all I thanked God that I was an American citizen. Now 
what is it that makes American citizenship so valu- 
able? What is it that makes possible our rapid prog- 
ress? What is it that enables us to enjoy the priceless 
prerogatives of freedom? What is it that enables the 
young republic to stand without peer or parallel among 
the nations? The value of citizenship, the rapidity of 
progress, the enjoyment of freedom, the glory of the 
republic are largely due to the operation in our history 
of the principle of fraternity. 

Fraternity inspired the American revolution and 
taught the ragged colonials to endure the woes of Val- 
.ley Forge. Fraternity presided with Washington over 
the constitutional convention of 1787, where was cre- 
ated the American Union. And it was fraternity that 
reconciled the American people forever in 1898. Fra- 
ternity made that year sacred. It was one of the most 
important years in our history. It marked the begin- 
ning of a new and brighter era. The liberation of ten 
million people from the bondage of tyranny gave new 
luster to American arms. It was the spirit of frater- 
nity that refused to permit the martyred heroes of the 
Maine to sleep unavenged in the waters of Havana 
harbor. In many respects the achievements of 1898 
may justly rank among the noblest efforts of mankind. 
It gave new names and deeds to immortality. The 
valor of Dewey at Manila, the courage of Bagley and 
Bernadou at Cienfuegos, the daring of Hobson on the 
merrimac, the movements of Schley, the bravery of 
Wheeler at Santiago, the heroic charges at San Juan 
and El Caney, the gallantry with which Evans and 
Wainwright greeted their illustrious captives, the kind- 
ness of our soldiers to the Spanish survivors of Manila 

177 

12 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



and Santiago, the tender words of Captain Philip, the 
victories on land and sea, constitute an epic age, a 
period throbbing with fraternal impulse. 

It is not surprising that the inauguration of free- 
dom through the influence of brotherhood and frater- 
nity should have signified the beginning of the bright- 
est era in the annals of earth. The world has but re- 
cently departed from the grave of the nineteenth cen- 
tury, the century that has elapsed since the birth of 
constitutional liberty and the disenthrallment of the 
mind — a century of progress far more rapid and benefi- 
cent than that of all preceding time, a century of un- 
exampled development and activity. It witnessed the 
transition from flint and steel to the lucifer match, 
from the tallow dip to the electric light. It witnessed 
the discovery of coal and the invention of the steam 
hammer, which together have given civilization arms 
of iron and fingers of steel. It witnessed the infinite 
extension of the uses of iron and steel, an extensioa 
notable most signally in the heavy rail that makes pos- 
sible the speed of modern trains, in the enormous 
bridges typifying the audacity and brilliancy of hu- 
man thought, in ships of combat and travel and trade, 
in the structures of the cities whose height and grace 
and strength compose a new architecture and con- 
stitute the truest symbol of the age. It witnessed 
the recovery of the country from the devastation of 
war and the restoration of universal loyalty. It wit- 
nessed the employment and perfection of steam, the 
elementary power of the century's growth, the power 
which applied to locomotion has made so rapid and 
extensive the interchange of commodities throughout 
the globe and the association of peoples of every race 
and climate that the world is experiencing the great- 

178 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



est material progress of its history — the power which 
applied to manufacture has brought the facilities as 
well as the indulgences and the necessities of civiliza- 
tion within the reach of the masses — the power which 
has increased the opportunities for the exercise of hu- 
man effort, and exalted the environment and destiny 
of man. It witnessed the development of electricity, 
the mightiest force which nature has as yet surren- 
dered — the force which is displacing all other agencies 
in every sphere of industry — the force which has abol- 
ished night, exterminated space, lengthened life, im- 
proved the general health, preserved and reproduced 
both speech and action — the force which has effected 
the almost instantaneous transmission of thought and 
knowledge to the remotest parts of earth and cre- 
ated a sense of world-unity and world-sympathy, 
marking a distinct step toward the brotherhood of 
man. It witnessed the most wonderful progress in 
agricultural implements and methods, in organizations 
for the protection of labor and in arbitration, in the 
construction of canals and reservoirs and in the mak- 
ing of arms, in all forms of printing and photography, 
in life-saving apparatus for land and sea, in mining 
processes, in discovery and in the excavation of for- 
gotten cities, in music, in science, in education, law and 
art, in philanthropy, in temperance, in the circulation 
of the Bible, and in the refinement and culture of the 
masses. 

I have alluded to these familiar illustrations of the 
last century's grandeur in order to emphasize the fact 
that one of its greatest achievements has not received 
the recognition it deserves. Within the last forty-five 
years one of the most colossal factors in contemporary 
civilization has been silently forming and growing 
until today it affects the lives and fortunes of more 

179 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



than thirty millions of the American people and exer- 
cises an unequaled influence upon the material prog- 
ress of the country. I refer to the system of fraternal 
insurance. History and the press have given far more 
attention to things of far smaller significance. Whether 
the lack of public notice is due to ignorance or to the 
intentional neglect of publications whose atmosphere 
is saturated with influences that oppose all enter- 
prises by which wealth is in any way deprived of its 
power to prey upon the people, I shall not attempt to 
demonstrate. But, despite the silence of written re- 
cord, the origin and growth of co-operative insurance 
equal in importance the revolution and the civil war. 
The revolution destroyed the tyranny of despotism; 
the fraternities are destroying the tyranny of pauper- 
ism. The civil war abolished the black slavery of 
domestic , bondage ; the fraternities are abolishing the 
white slavery of want. And when the meaning and 
extent of fraternal insurance shall have been under- 
stood by the American people they will behold with 
astonishment the triumphant operation of one of the 
most beneficent movements in all history. 

Over six million American citizens are numbered 
today among the active members of American frater- 
nal insurance orders. It is safe to say that those de- 
pendent on these soldiers of humanity will swell the 
number of those directly affected by the system to more 
than thirty millions. The fraternal insurance system 
erects above these dear, dependent ones, above the sil- 
ver locks and bending forms of mothers, above wives, 
sweethearts and sisters, above the dimpled hands and 
rippling laughter of little children a golden canopy of 
protection. The system has paid since its humble be- 
ginning over thirteen hundred million dollars to the 
widows and orphans of the American people. It is 

180 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



distributing a hundred millions every year, over eight 
million dollars every month, over two hundred and 
sixty-six thousand dollars every day, over eleven thou- 
sand dollars every hour. Think of the American homes 
that every hour are being redeemed from poverty ! The 
memory of the dead is made sweeter, the darkness 
is lifted from the doorway. When I contemplate this 
fraternal crusade, when I think of this stream of gold 
as it drives the shadows from the brow of grief, illu- 
minates despair, directs the helpless and the weak 
toward virtue, industry and honor, guides millions of 
young lives to usefulness and hope, it becomes a mat- 
ter of wonder to me that every American citizen does 
not hasten to identify himself with such a movement. 
And I feel that the man who opposes or discourages 
it is profaning an instrument of Almighty God. 

The principal object of the fraternal system is the 
co-operative distribution of life insurance at the least 
possible cost, with the elimination of the idea of profit 
from the process. It is the true and the logical method 
of life insurance. Insurance is not properly a source 
of gain. Insurance is a division of losses, not of profits. 
It is the mode through which the loss sustained by one 
or more on account of the death of another is distri- 
buted throughout the community. Thus the burden 
which would frequently prove unbearable to the one or 
to the few is lightened by apportionment among the 
many. And that system which collects and distributes 
these losses at the least possible cost with no idea of 
gain is the just and proper system. And when it is re- 
called that the dependents of the overwhelming mass of 
people are in greatest need of insurance, the necessity 
and the propriety of a co-operative, self-governing, 
non-commercial, fraternal organization becomes imme- 
diately apparent. Pecuniary profit has no legitimate 

181 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



place in a process which is essentially non-speculative. 

It is proper to state here that the laws of mortality 
act with equal regularity in both fraternal and old line 
systems, that the mathematical principles of insurance 
are the same, whether placed in operation by the fra- 
ternal order or the old line company. The actual cost 
of insurance is the same in both methods. The rules 
of life expectancy and liability to death are the same in 
each. The difference lies in the fact that the fraternal 
order endeavors to exemplify the principle of insur- 
ance through a self-governing, non-speculative organi- 
zation, while the old line company uses this principle 
to enrich the company's owners and promoters. The 
rates of the old line companies, therefore, materially 
exceed the rates of the fraternal orders. The excess 
is due to no difference in principle, but in the method 
of applying the principle. The underlying object of 
the old line company is gain ; that of the fraternal order 
is protection. It cannot be denied that old line com- 
panies have been of great benefit to society. Insofar 
as they have dealt in insurance proper they have aided 
mankind. But, in combining speculation with insur- 
ance in order to make money for managers or stock- 
holders, they have increased the expense element of 
their charges out of all proportion to the real cost of 
insurance. 

It is unfair to compare the investment phase of 
old line insurance with the purely fraternal plan. They 
are entirely different things. Insofar as the invest- 
ment feature is concerned the old line company ceases 
to be an insurance organization. To those fortunate 
people who have money for investment at long time 
and small interest the old line company is an advan- 
tage. But it is wrong in principle to expose insurance 
funds to the risks of ordinary business operation 5 ;. And 

182 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



the inordinate premium charge necessary to make pos- 
sible the payment of dividends, surrenders, loans, en- 
ormous salaries, or princely profits not only places 
life insurance proper beyond the reach of the masses 
who want protection without speculation, but demoral- 
izes the entire insurance business. President Green, of 
the Connecticut Mutual, says: "One of the strangest 
developments in life insurance in the last twenty-five 
years has been the increase in its expense account. 
While that of every other enterprise and industry has 
been studiously watched and pruned at every possible 
point, and its reduction has been a prime and perma- 
nent aim of management, not only as a means of great 
profit to the business, but as a necessity in meeting 
competition by greater cheapness, the expense account 
of life insurance has gone the other way. The compe- 
tition has not been by way of lessening cost secuied 
by prudence and economy. Those companies have 
secured and are securing the best new business which 
have made their insurance cost their policyholders 
most, and are making it cost most today." Such is 
the note of warning which has been sounded by an 
old line president. 

I have briefly referred to some of the distinguish- 
ing features of the old line system in order to show 
that the difference in the amount of the old line prem- 
ium and the fraternal assessment lies in the expense 
element and not in actual mortality cost. If the fra- 
ternal system of non-speculative protection prevailed 
today in all forms of life insurance countless millions 
would be saved to the American people. The fraternal 
system represents brotherhood as against dollarhood. 
The companies point to the dividend, the surrender 
value, the cash return; the fraternals point to the 
home, the wife, the child. Fraternity has millions for 

183 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



protection, but not one cent for speculation; millions 
for charity, but not one cent for profit; millions for 
God, but not one cent for Croesus. 

In the Woodmen of the World, a typical fraternal 
insurance order, fraternity finds an incarnation worthy 
of its majesty and meaning, an embodiment in which 
it renders priceless service to humanity. Woodcraft 
inspires and fosters the noblest principles of human 
conduct. It is the uplifting force of civilization. It 
is the star-light above the dusk of sordid aim and 
selfish deed. It is the gold the stream of life leaves 
glistening on the shores and sands of time. It gives 
the Sermon on the Mount expression in the lives of 
men; it is the Lord's prayer in benignant operation. 
It is the fountain of charity, the source of sacrifice. 
It teaches through ritual and ceremony that man 
should be placed above mammon, God above gold. It 
teaches that men are equal and tolerates not the paltry 
distinctions of rank and class. It teaches that the 
man of the field and shop is as useful to society as 
the man of the bank and board of trade. It teaches 
that man is to be honored for what he is and not for 
what he has. Woodcraft welds men together in the 
crucible of brotherhood and from the mingled fires 
there pours a flame of love which in the Almighty's 
selected time will sweep war and hatred from the 
earth. It teaches forbearance for the faults, en- 
couragement for the merits of our fellow-men. It 
teaches that humanity's highest mission is the relief 
of pain. It teaches sympathy for those within whose 
lives the light of hope has gone out in the dark of 
failure. It teaches assistance for the unfortunate, the 
distressed, the poor. It teaches mercy for the sinning, 
tenderness for the wayward, compassion for the fal- 
len. It teaches mutual support in the trials and con- 

184 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



flicts of life. It has smiles for the living and tears for 
the dead. It soothes the brow of grief and binds up 
the shattered fragments of the broken heart. It shields 
the mother, the child and guards the home. And the 
fact that the principal objects of Woodcraft are the 
protection of woman and the preservation of the home 
at a cost within the means of the masses makes this 
order an instrument of the greatest benefit humanity 
has received since the proclamation of the Gospel. 

Over 200 fraternal beneficiary orders are in opera- 
tion today with over eight billions of insurance in force. 
The progress of the first four decades of fraternalism 
has been marvelous. It is true that mistakes have been 
made and that failures have occurred. No institution 
under human control is entirely free from the possi- 
bility of disaster. As has been the case with every 
other movement in the history of the world the begin- 
ning of the fraternal system was unscientific and crude. 
But when it is remembered that impediments of the 
gravest nature have been overcome, the advancement 
of fraternalism may be fairly regarded as one of the 
most remarkable features of an age whose chief charac- 
teristic has been rapidity of progress in every phase of 
human endeavor. 

It is perhaps advisable to state here that the general 
failure of business associations using the insurance 
method employed by many of the fraternals — the as- 
sessment method — has been frequently and unjustly 
imputed to the fraternal system. Although these as- 
sociations are termed co-operative and mutual, and 
although they operate on the assessment plan, they 
do not possess the elements fundamentally character- 
istic of the fraternal order. These elements are the 
lodge system and representative government. These 
associations substitute for the lodge local boards and 

185 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



committees, and their management is entirely auto- 
cratic. They have the old line feature of private gain 
without the corresponding feature of high rate. They 
have the fraternal feature of low rate without the cor- 
responding features of the lodge system and repre- 
sentative government. The inevitable result is that 
they are deprived of the enthusiasm of membership 
which alone makes insurance at the low rate of the 
fraternal order possible, and that they are rapidly dis- 
integrating. 

It is the lodge system combined with representative 
government that explains the success of the fraternal 
order. It is through these elements that the principle 
of fraternity finds expression and operation. It 
is through these elements that the members partici- 
pate in the control of the order and come to feel 
a personal interest in its welfare. It is through the 
lodge that the members are led to realize the glories 
of brotherhood. It is in the lodge that the real life of 
order is to be found. For it is through the lodge 
that the sick are visited, the unfortunate relieved, the 
poor assisted, and the dead interred. And it is in the 
lodge that through ritual, through ceremony, through 
degree work, through entertainment and celebration 
of various forms enthusiasm for the success of the 
order and devotion to its principles are aroused, and 
efforts are made for new members, without which the 
organization could not live. In Woodcraft we call 
our lodges camps, and other orders have designations 
for their local bodies suggested by their respective 
rituals. Enthusiasm accomplishes for the fraternals 
what accumulation accomplishes for the companies. 
The fraternal system is, therefore, in a large sense its 
own organizer and thus alone is it feasible to give in- 
surance at low cost to the masses. The importance of 

186 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



lodge work cannot be overestimated. The lodge is 
the unit of the organization; upon the enthusiasm and 
interest of its members depend not only the prosperity 
but the existence of the order. I appeal, therefore, to 
every Woodman and to every other fraternalist in the 
name of the struggling masses to take more interest 
in the local camp or lodge. Upon the attendance and 
interest of the individual members of the local lodges 
of the various orders rests the whole fabric of frater- 
nalism. Woodman, the future of Woodcraft is in 
your hands. Maccabee, the success of Maccabeeism 
rests with you. Pythian, Workman, Heptasoph, For- 
ester, fraternalists in general, this same statement is 
addressed to you. The members who attend lodge 
meetings, who fill the offices and perform the labors, 
who take a faithful interest in the affairs of the order 
are benefactors of humanity. When the individual 
members cease to take an active interest in an order 
its doom is settled, its end is near. The hope of 
co-operative insurance lies in the substitution of 
fraternal enthusiasm for corporate cash. When every 
member of every fraternal insurance order shall have 
become an apostle, and every lodge an apostolate of 
fraternal interest and principle the success of co-opera- 
tive insurance with its limitless possibilities for good 
will have been definitely assured. 

The progress of fraternalism may be ascribed 
to the lodge system and representative govern- 
ment. It is on account of the solidifying influence of 
these elements that the fraternals have survived 
changes of plans, double assessments and increases of 
rates which in a mere business organization would 
mean serious disturbance if not destruction. With 
but few exceptions fraternal orders began with insuf- 
ficient rates. This may be attributed to the failure 

187 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



to recognize mortality's basic law that liability to 
death increases with age, and that, therefore, the 
actual cost of insurance increases with age. Most 
of the insurance fraternities were inaugurated with 
a rate that barely covered the cost of insurance 
at the age of entry, without provision for the 
added cost occasioned by the member's growing age. 
Like every other human undertaking, fraternal insur- 
ance has had to pass through succeeding stages of de- 
velopment and experience. And, like every other hu- 
man undertaking, it has serious problems yet to solve. 
Fraternalism is still in an era of formation, and the 
Woodmen of the World, through the adoption of the 
accumulative certificate, the establishment of an 
emergency fund — now approximately eleven millions 
— has placed its plan upon a scientific basis and stepped 
to the forefront of fraternal progress. Its percentage 
of expense to income is moderately low. Indeed, it is 
in many respects the torch-bearer of the fraternal 
system. 

The Woodmen of the World offers today the most 
powerful and practical method of aiding and elevating 
humanity. It is the finest system of effective benevo- 
lence the world has yet seen. There are men, how- 
ever, who have forgotten the higher obligations in 
the pursuit of wealth. They are like the gnomes 
in Wagner's Rheingold who for centuries have 
crouched beneath the waters of the Rhine clutch- 
ing with misshapen fingers the gold within its rocks 
and sands. They have no other feeling than a fiendish 
exultation in the glitter of the gold. Such men 
may be successes in business, but they are failures 
in life. They hide the death's-head of moral ruin 
in the mask of business success. Though possessed 
of countless millions they are bankrupts of the 

188 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



soul and insolvents of the heart. Business men of 
every degree should become members of some reliable 
fraternal insurance order. More than ninety of every 
hundred men in business fail — and in the days of 
financial misfortune fraternal insurance will be not a 
burden, but an encouragement. 

There are reasons of the most selfish nature which 
should prompt every capitalist, every banker, every 
bond-holder, every business man, every professional 
man actively to support the Woodmen of the World. 
For these men are particularly interested in the con- 
tinuance of orderly civilization, and they are directly 
benefited by every influence that tends to repress an- 
archy, to allay discontent, to lessen pauperism, idle- 
ness and crime, to increase the security of investment 
and the safety of capital. The educated and wealthy 
few need no especial care; it is the prosperity of 
the masses that determines the real stability of a 
nation. The refined and enlightened few may be 
found in every period of history, but the true progress 
of the world is based upon the condition of the people 
in general. The surest guaranty of society and govern- 
ment is the individual ownership of homes. Wood- 
craft is the greatest home-builder of the centuries. In- 
separately connected with the home is the mother. 
Civilization and fraternity meet on the doorstep of the 
home ; they worship at the shrine of the mother. The 
mother and the home are the central figures of civiliza- 
tion; they are the principal objects of fraternal care. 
And when American civilization is to be exalted 
through the protection of the American woman and 
the American home, no true American should hesitate 
to join the Woodmen of the World, one of the 
strongest agencies for the accomplishment of this 
purpose. 

189 



The Progress of Fraternalism 



On the summit of the castle of St. Angelo at Rome 
stands the bronze figure of an angel with uplifted 
sword. During one of the fiercest French-Italian wars 
this castle had been captured by a small force of 
Frenchmen who were soon surrounded by the enemy 
in overwhelming numbers. Exhibiting the sublimest 
courage the beleaguered Frenchmen resisted siege and 
charge for many days. It became at last apparent that 
their destruction was inevitable. Prompted by ad- 
miration for such valor the enemy's commander sus- 
pended battle and summoned the French captain to 
surrender. "We will surrender," the brave French 
captain thundered in reply, "when the bronze angel 
sheathes its sword." Oh, may similar determination 
inspire all members of the Woodmen of the World 
today and of all the other armies of fraternity! 



^ 



190 



ADDRESS ON BEHALF OF SOVEREIGN 
CAMP, AT COLUMBUS, OHIO. 

IN RESPONSE TO MAYOR HINKLE'S WELCOME, 
MAY 14, 1901. 

WITH unusual pleasure we accept the 
greeting so hospitably extended, so eloquently 
expressed. The Woodmen of the World 
emerges from the first decade of its existence pano- 
plied with success. Cradled in the genius and vitalized 
by the energies of its immortal founder it has swept 
like an eagle from the valley to the peak. The hosts 
of opposition have fallen or fled. 

Ten years have flown since Joseph Cullen Root, in 
the prime of manhood, inspired by as noble an impulse 
as ever thrilled the soul of man, planted Woodcraft's 
standards on the banks of the Missouri. Among the 
mountains of the West, where the flowers and the 
snows divided the kisses of the sun, the lips of Falken- 
burg were speaking the gospel of the new fraternity. 
Beneath these standards the people gathered, not for 
conquest, but for country; not for profit, but for pro- 
tection; not for battle, but for brotherhood. And as 
the months have widened into the years, the years 
into the decade, the order has grown in popularity 
and strength until today more than 200,000 Woodmen 
are pouring down the crest of the twentieth century. 
Before another decade shall have passed, the grand 
divisions of Woodcraft will march in review before 
our Sovereign Commander, saluting him with the song, 
"We are coming, Father Root, ten hundred thousand 
strong." 

It is difficult to estimate the importance of this 
meeting, the solemnity of its duties. The masses 

191 



Address at Columbus, Ohio 



of the order have confided to this body the guardian- 
ship of its growth, the formation of its policies. The 
Sovereign Camp is the flower and the pride of Wood- 
craft. It is for the Sovereign Camp to originate the 
policy which, like the scarlet thread of Rahab, shall 
lead us to safety and prosperity. It is for the Sov- 
ereign Camp to protect and strengthen the structure 
of the fraternity with the iron cables of salutary laws. 
It is impossible to measure by mere human calculation 
our responsibilities. To attempt to do so would be 
another task of Icarus, foredoomed to fail. 

In the dusk of evening I see a Woodman's humble 
home. At the gate is the father returning from the 
work of the day covered with the stains of toil, the 
insignia of the only real nobility. In the doorway 
is the mother, poised like the Argive Hera — a 
queen uncrowned. About her are children in whose 
locks the sunset seems imprisoned. A silence falls 
upon that group and they turn toward this Sov- 
ereign Camp. The dimpled hands of little children 
are in suppliance extended, the mother's eyes, dimming 
with prophetic tears, as she thinks of the day when 
the Woodmen certificate may be her only aid, are 
prayerfully regarding us; and the father with mourn- 
ful earnestness joins the pleading. Multiply that home 
by one hundred thousand and you will have some con- 
ception of the trust we have been commissioned to 
discharge. 

God give us the strength, the intelligence and the 
courage to legislate in the interest of one hundred 
thousand homes. 



^ 



192 



RESPONSE TO THE TOAST, "THE 
STATE OF OHIO." 

AT THE WOODMEN OF THE WORLD BANQUET, 

COLUMBUS, OHIO, GREAT SOUTHERN 

HOTEL, MAY 21, 1901. 

IT IS proper that the governing body of an 
organization based and builded on the principle 
of fraternity should assemble in the state of Ohio. 
A territory of lovely slopes and fertile valleys held 
like a picture in the arms of Lake Erie and the Ohio 
river, the gift of Connecticut and Virginia to the 
nation, its history interweaves romance, tradition, war 
and progress. 

Its history is almost cosmic in its tracings of an 
ancient civilization, almost universal in its connection 
with the world-movements of pre-revolutionary eras, 
almost philosophical in its contributions to the develop- 
ment of human freedom and almost national in its 
relation to the growth and permanence of the Ameri- 
can Union. 

The central and western portions of the state are 
covered with the footprints of a people more remote 
from mortal chronicle than the inhabitants of ancient 
Egypt. The hills that necklace Chillicothe are the 
tumuli of the immense communities of a long de- 
parted age, while the Hocking and Miami valleys are 
filled with the ruins of a cultured but unpenetrated 
past. 

Within this land the confederated Iroquois ter- 
rorized the native tribes. Within this land La Salle 
and Joliet unfurled above the new France the lilies 
of the old. From Erie's shores La Salle's adventurous 
spirit led him finally to Texas, where he tragically died 

193 

13 



Response to the Toast, "The State of Ohio" 

in the tangled forests of the Trinity. After the coming 
of La Salle France and England here struggled for 
supremacy, and in these conflicts Washington obtained 
the prominence which later widened into immortality. 
Here, by the treaty of 1763, a convention of world con- 
sequence, France ceded the land to England, and then 
was witnessed the exciting period of early settlement, 
the coming of Putnam, Cleveland, and the other pio- 
neers, the battles with the savages and the snows, the 
conspiracies of Pontiac and Tecumseh, the consum- 
mating triumph of Mad Anthony at Maumee. 

Here, through the memorable ordinance of 1787 for 
the government of the northwestern territory, the civil 
authority of the United States was definitely estab- 
lished. Through that ordinance Ohio became signally 
connected with the progress of human freedom. By 
its terms slavery was forever prohibited in the north- 
west. It was, therefore, the prototype of the emancipa- 
tion proclamation seventy-five years later. It con- 
tained the first express legal inhibition against the 
impairment of contractual obligations and legislative 
destruction of private rights. It was consequently a 
precedent and an inspiration for Webster and Mar- 
shall in the Dartmouth college case. 

Admitted as a statein 1803 Ohio's fortunes became 
more intimately linked with those of the Union. At 
Marietta was erected the fleet that was intended to 
establish Burr's dream of empire. At Forts Croghan 
and Meigs the British, flushed with the victory at De- 
troit, were repulsed. Ohio contributed 320,000 men to 
the federal forces of the civil war, more than one-tenth 
the entire Union army. Ohio has glorified the annals 
of patriotism with the eloquence of Corwin, the learn- 
ing of Chase, the fluency of Sunset Cox. From the 
Ashtabula district came three giant sons, Whittlesey, 

194 



Response to the Toast, "The State of Ohio" 

Giddings and Garfield, who with unusual capacity 
represented Ohio for fifty-four years in the American 
Congress. Here Garfield rose, in whom the blood of 
Puritan and Huguenot mingling with seven American 
generations united to compose a marvelous personality, 
who ascended from canal and farm to presidency and 
senate, adorning bench and bar and battlefield with the 
radiance of native genius, whose successes in the Big 
Sandy campaign and in the armies of the Ohio and the 
Cumberland invested his name with military renown. 
And here arose the man who is in many respects the 
most conspicuous figure of one of the most significant 
epochs in the history of the republic, and whom, I, a 
Democrat, believe should be revered by all sections, 
parties and all creeds as the founder of the New 
America which sprang steel-crested, like a God un- 
chained, from the flaming loins of Santiago and Manila, 
William McKinley. 

It is appropriate, I repeat, that we should meet in 
a land where so many patriotic memories speak the 
heritage of a glorious past. And no lovelier spot could 
have been selected than this charming city of Colum- 
bus, where the waters of the Scioto and the Whetstone 
have begun a bridal journey to the ocean, and where 
the enchantments of natural beauty are garlanded with 
the Doric majesty of a mighty capitol. 

2CC 



195 



ADDRESS PRESENTING JEWEL TO 
SOVEREIGN COMMANDER ROOT. 

BEFORE SOVEREIGN CAMP DELEGATES ON AN 

EXCURSION STEAMER ON LAKE MICHIGAN 

DURING MILWAUKEE SOVEREIGN CAMP, 

MAY. 1903. 

SOVEREIGN Commander and Sovereigns: In 
attempting to voice the spirit of this occasion I 
pause in silence and in awe. There are senti- 
ments too deep for language; emotions too profound 
for words. 

I am commissioned by the representatives who 
compose the supreme legislative body of the Wood- 
men of the World to present to you, Sovereign Com- 
mander, this jewel. It brings a message from more 
than a million hearts — a message which my feeble lips 
are powerless to convey. 

For more than twenty years you have been a prom- 
inent factor in the progress of America. Twenty-one 
years ago you conceived the name and purpose of the 
organization that has made your name immortal. 
You stood among the pioneers of fraternal insurance 
and gave them energy through your example — inspira- 
tion through your success. You have given the princi- 
ples of fraternalism the profoundest study. You have 
become a leader in fraternal thought, a giant in fra- 
ternal effort, and to you may be attributed a large 
part of the credit for the existence and the prosperity 
of the fraternal insurance system. It may safely be 
asserted that no other man combines a more vigorous 
comprehension of the practical requirements with a 
more thorough mastery of the philosophy of this sys- 
tem than Joseph Cullen Root. 

196 



Presenting Jewel to Sov. Com. Root 

For more than twenty years you have endured the 
toil, the trial and the pain of exhausting and unceasing 
effort. With the patience of a martyr you have borne 
the enmity and opposition that are the real marks of 
greatness. With courage rarely equaled you have re- 
sisted prejudice and hate. Gathering strength from 
every struggle, unstained by compromise with honor, 
unscarred by failure, supported by the standards of a 
lofty manhood, you are today the idol and the pillar 
of more than a million homes. 

From these homes this jewel brings a tribute of 
gratitude and love. It is appropriate that such a tri- 
bute should find expression in a token composed of the 
most marvelous products of the material world. In 
the laboratory of nature God's countless centuries 
have fashioned the diamond and the gold. In these 
jewels are concentrated the supreme development 
of material evolution. They glass unnumbered epochs 
in the silent history of the soil. They imprison the 
volcano's flame, the snows and fires of ages, the 
blended essence of forest, marsh and sea — all crushed 
and trampled by the tread of time into a dazzling 
mirror of physical perfection. So Woodcraft reflects 
the progress of fraternity and embodies the struggles 
and the hopes of man. In founding the Woodmen of 
the World you crystalized fraternal advancement and 
gave to fraternity its purest illustration. 

It is, therefore, with especial propriety that we pre- 
sent to you, the author of Woodcraft, fraternity's most 
perfect jewel, this glittering crown of nature's suprem- 
est effort. In it are concentrated the affection, the ad^ 
miration and the solicitude of the toiling hosts of 
Woodcraft — the blessings, prayers and grateful tears 
of the thousands whom this order has aided and re- 
lieved. We present it as an endorsement of the past, 

197 



Presenting Jewel to Sov. Com. Root 

an encouragement for the future. May the spirit that 
broods upon these waters guide you to continued 
honor, to repeated glory. 



RESPONSE OF SOVEREIGN COMMANDER 
JOSEPH CULLEN ROOT. 

Sovereigns: I hardly know what to say to ex- 
press my appreciation and thanks for your generous 
gift. I feel my own unworthiness more than I am able 
to state, coming to me at a time when I was least ex- 
pecting such an evidence of your confidence. Yet, I 
will assure you that I shall prize it as long as I live, 
and it will become my most treasured heirloom to 
hand down to future generations. 

Sovereigns, I have endeavored to do the best I 
could in the interests of fraternity and for the better- 
ment of the conditions of my fellow-men. I entered 
into this work twenty-one years ago, when I had bril- 
liant prospects in other directions, not for the gain I 
might derive, but from the fact that I believed there 
was a greater mission before me than laboring for 
sordid gain. I felt that I had inspiration from Al- 
mighty God to spur me on to help, in my feeble way, 
the good work that appeared to be laid out for me. 

I thought, as I undertook to interest the congre- 
gating, or associating together, large numbers of men 
and women, if you please, to carry out the principles 
of the fraternal beneficiary system, which was then in 
its infancy, as only a few years before Father Upchurch 
had suggested the idea, which others materialized, and 
which from year to year received an impetus through- 
out the land, that by a conservative compromise of the 
plans then existing there might be evolved a system 

198 



Presenting Jewel to Sov. Com. Root 

that would in due time attain perfection. With the 
assistance of the wise heads that have come to us, who 
have allied their fortunes with ours, we have succeeded, 
I believe in perfecting our system and making it today 
the model fraternal beneficiary organization of the 
world. But let me say, however, that what might be 
brought about has not been accomplished. We have 
not reached the goal of our ambition. We have not as 
yet taken the glad tidings of fraternal regard and mut- 
ual beneficence to all the peoples of the earth. 

Let me say that for what has been done the praise 
belongs to you. Aye, I would not take to myself the 
credit for this grand work. It is you who have assisted 
me; you who have helped. 

I believe the seed that has been planted in Ameri- 
ca's fertile soil will bring forth fruitage that will pro- 
duce good results, that will elevate the condition of 
mankind in every country and in every nation in the 
future that is before us. 

Sovereigns, I cannot thank you enough for this ex- 
pression of your confidence. I can only say with God's 
help I hope in the future to merit that confidence, and 
so long as I do I will feel that I have the members in 
the United States and Canada back of me to receive 
their endorsement and assistance; and if there is any- 
thing I may do that is wrong, that I will, and should, 
receive the condemnation of this great army of good 
men and noble women. 

Yes, I thank you. You can hardly realize how full 
my heart is today; you can hardly realize how touch- 
ing this incident is to me. And I can only say in con- 
clusion that you have done a liberal act; you have 
done that which does you credit as it does me honor, 
and I trust that when I shall be able to meet any of 
the present Sovereign Camp, wherever it may be, that 

199 



Presenting Jewel to Sov. Com. Root 

I may take you by the hand and may feel that your 
heart is in your hand, as it is in mine. 

I thank you. I thank you more than I can find 
words to express. 



200 



A TRIBUTE TO FALKENBURG. 

SPEECH SECONDING NOMINATION OF SOVER- 
EIGN ADVISER F. A. FALKENBURG, ALSO HEAD 
CONSUL, PACIFIC JURISDICTION, FOR VICE 
PRESIDENT NATIONAL FRATERNAL 
CONGRESS, MILWAUKEE, AUGUST, 
1903. 

IN THE selection of the vice president of the Na- 
tional Fraternal Congress the deciding test is, in 
my opinion, the extent to which a brother typifies 
the cause and character of this organization. Inspired 
by such a sentiment I desire to second the nomination 
of the man whose life and effort mirror the history 
of fraternal development, whose name is a summary 
of the fraternal advancement of America, an assurance 
of the future of fraternal growth, whose philosophy 
is brotherhood, whose gospel is love, one of the typical 
fraternalists of the time, the pride and idol of western 
fraternalism, Brother F. A. Falkenburg of Colorado. 
Nurtured amid the ennobling influences of an Indi- 
ana home, he obtained a collegiate and legal training 
and began in Indianapolis the practice of law. Five 
years later he surrendered a remunerative clientage, a 
brilliant professional prospect to devote his energies to 
the promotion of fraternity. The west became the 
theater of his toil, the scene of his crusade against the 
squadrons of poverty and death. In 1899 he conducted 
at sunrise on the summit of Pike's Peak one of the 
most picturesque initiations in fraternal history, a con- 
ception of his artistic soul, an event which attracted the 
attention of the fraternal world. And for the originator 
of that Miltonic spectacle a career began which is prob- 
ably unsurpassed in the records of fraternal enterprise. 
The order under his control, the Pacific Juris- 

201 



A Tribute to Falkenburg 



diction of the Woodmen of the World, embracing 
nine western states, a mountainous area of more 
than 800,000 square miles, nearly a third of the 
surface of the United States, yet with a population 
smaller by 400,000 than that of the single state of Ohio, 
has within thirteen years acquired a membership of 
90,000, a monument to his tirelessness and strength. 
With remarkable courage and endurance he has tra- 
versed that mighty region, enrapturing multitudes more 
vast, receiving ovations more spontaneous and contin- 
uous than any other fraternalist, living or dead, in the 
annals of the west, converting thousands to the fra- 
ternal doctrine, taking personally from the platform 
at Portland, Oregon, 1,200 applications in one week — 
traveling in one of his celebrated campaigns over 9,800 
miles in six months, speaking publicly on every night, 
with but two exceptions, and receiving personally over 
4,000 applications — impressing his lovable character 
upon the western heart — voicing his faith with forceful 
eloquence. 

In addition to his record as an organizer, and his 
supremacy as an orator, he has an executive and legal 
capacity of the rarest type. For twenty years a con- 
stant student of the science of insurance, an actuary of 
distinct attainment, he has ever urged for both his own 
and all other societies the adoption of the most pro- 
gressive standards. In manner gentle, in action firm, 
in character spotless and in speech superb, he will 
adorn the official roster of this body, and I deem it an 
honor to present his name. 



IF 



202 



THE STATE OF TENNESSEE. 

EXTRACT FROM OPENING ADDRESS, SOVEREIGN 
CAMP, CHATTANOOGA, TENNESSEE, MAY, 1905. 

THIS is a remarkable hour. It is an anniversary 
of a glorious past, a point of preparation for a 
more glorious future. We rejoice in what we 
have accomplished; we anticipate with confidence 
what we may yet achieve. Pausing for a moment to 
survey the heights below, the summits we have scaled 
and conquered, we turn with undaunted resolution 
toward the peaks above us. The importance of the 
occasion to us is overwhelming. It marks the highest 
stage yet reached in the growth of one of the most 
promising fraternal organization of the time, the 
Woodmen of the World. Our advancement is in many 
respects unparalleled. Victory has succeeded victory; 
truimph has followed triumph. 

It is fitting that our national legislative body, the 
Sovereign Camp, should assemble in the state of Ten- 
nessee, a state that has been ever foremost in the cause 
of freedom and fraternity. The founders of this state 
planted the banners of liberty west of the Alleghenies 
and dedicated that vast area to republican ideals. Thus 
this state became the link that made secure the Missis- 
sippi as the interior boundary of colonial territory and 
made inevitable the acquisition of the Louisiana do- 
main. Its place in American history is fundamental. 
The story of its early years is a story of stirring deeds 
and noble sacrifice. It is beyond human power to 
describe the suffering its pioneers endured in estab- 
lishing settlements at Fort Loudon and on the 
Watauga and Holston rivers. The wilderness had no 
terror, the savage no atrocity that could permanently 

203 



The State of Tennessee 



oppose them. Butchery and captivity were but tem- 
porary barriers. Year after year the brave frontiers- 
men from North Carolina and other colonies crossed 
the Blue Ridge to return no more. Viewing this new- 
world paradise from some acclivity of the Unaka, the 
Smoky or the Bald, the child of Vikings with ten cen- 
turies of adventure resurgent in his blood felt that 
on some highland, terrace, plain or rampart of this 
sublime expanse he would most probably find his 
grave. Amid such surroundings Tennessee was born. 
From the caress of death and tears, the kiss of blood 
and steel, there rose a race of men and women as 
brave and gentle, as chivalrous and fair as ever glori- 
fied humanity. 

When the tocsin of revolution sang a call to arms 
Tennessee sent its sons back across the Appalachians 
to resist the tyrant. When some four decades later 
the despot again profaned the soil of the republic Ten- 
nessee gave Andrew Jackson to the conflict and Jack- 
son gave to our arms a victory that will ornament 
them forever. When twenty years afterward the hero 
of New Orleans reached the crest of his career as 
president of the country he had preserved, Tennessee 
found honor in the fact that it had given the Union 
the firmest champion of the people's rights since the 
sainted Jefferson. 

But Tennessee made perhaps its greatest contri- 
bution to the cause of human liberty when it gave 
Houston and Crockett to the struggle of the Texan 
patriots — Houston and Crockett who became essen- 
tial elements in the success of the southwestern revolu- 
tionists and who aided materially in the establishment 
of Texan independence. For the heritage of their 
names and deeds, the inspiration of their examples, the 

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The State of Tennessee 



influence of their lives Texas kneels in gratitude at 
the feet of Tennessee. 

In James K. Polk Tennessee gave the United States 
a president whose grasp of public affairs was of utmost 
service in a period of economic transition. Tennessee 
became the theater of many of the deadliest conflicts 
of the American civil war, giving its sons to both 
sides of the unhappy strife, but aligning mainly with 
the south. Rising in heroic outline above the fury of 
the time is the figure of Isham G. Harris, one of the 
chief pillars of the southern cause. No state illus- 
trated more vividly the fratricidal character of the 
conflict and no state typifies today more signally a 
reunited country. 

So it is most appropriate that in a state once shat- 
tered by dissension, but now symbolic of harmony 
and peace, the supreme representative body of an 
organization whose guiding principle is brotherhood 
should assemble. Yea, the fact that we, the sons and 
grandsons of federals and confederates who stood 
on crimson fields and in the presence of their dead 
swore mutual hatred and extermination, meet tonight 
upon the very scenes of battles that rank among the 
bloodiest of that bloody era to interchange assurances 
of sympathy and love, not shell and saber stroke — - 
coming from every section to unite through the pro- 
motion of the Woodmen of the World in the further- 
ance of the highest interests of a common country and 
a common flag, is a tribute never before surpassed to 
the principle of fraternity. 



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205 



TRIBUTE TO VIRGINIA. 

ADDRESS AT OPENING OF SOVEREIGN CAMP AT 
NORFOLK, MAY, 1907. 

SOVEREIGN Commander and Fellow Sovereigns: 
It would be impossible to select a more appro- 
priate theater for the deliberations of this body 
than the state of Virginia, a commonwealth of such 
influence in human affairs that its birth is justly cele- 
brated as the "birth of the American republic." There 
is an added significance in the fact that we meet within 
the limits of an exposition commemorating the birth 
of Virginia and the nation. The genesis of Virginia 
and the United States marked the beginning on a 
new continent of the ideas of brotherhood and free- 
dom which their governments embody and to which 
our order has given an effective expression. Thus we 
celebrate today the inauguration and advancement of 
three great exemplars of fraternity, the rise to loftier 
skies of three luminaries of humanity, the common- 
wealth of Virginia, the republic of the United States, 
and the Woodmen of the World. Virginia and the 
United States were founded in 1607, the Woodmen 
of the World in 1890. In 1624, seventeen years after 
its birth, Virginia had about 3,000 English inhabitants, 
including men, women and children — the territory of 
what was later known as the United States not more 
than 4,000. Today, seventeen years after its beginning, 
the Woodmen of the World has over 500,000 members, 
counting men alone; adding women and children, it 
throws a protecting wing over more than two millions 
of the human race — two millions who lay garlands of 
gratitude at the feet of the man whose efforts for the 
relief of human pain elevate him above earth's titled 

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Tribute to Virginia 



and exalted, Joseph Cullen Root. I would rather take 
with him one mother's wasted hand, and walk the 
shining lanes of judgment, than to be accompanied by 
all the conquerors and captains of the world. 

In fashioning the physical outlines of Virginia, 
nature must have foreseen its history and designed the 
slopes and terraces that form an irregular stairway 
from the plains of tidewater to the Appalachian crest 
as stages on which, before a world-audience, were to 
develop many of the mightiest figures and most re- 
markable events of time. Three centuries ago the 
dauntless spirits who were to enact the opening scenes 
upon this rugged arena were swept by a storm within 
the Virginia capes to face a storm of arrows from the 
Virginia shore. Three centuries ago they founded 
Jamestown, Virginia, and the nation, the stroke of axes 
and the fall of trees announcing that the colonies 
had become Woodmen in order to inaugurate a 
colossal era in the records of humanity. Prompted by 
the impulses of practical brotherhood they combatted 
pestilence, dissension, war, to win an eternal laurel as 
the founders of the first permanent English settlement 
on this hemisphere. A year before the Mayflower and 
the Pilgrim Fathers reached the coast of Massachu- 
setts, these Virginia pioneers established the first rep- 
resentative assembly on the American continent. A 
few years later, in 1624, more than 150 years before 
the Declaration of Independence, they asserted the 
right of taxation by representation. Fifty years later 
and more than a century in advance of the American 
revolution, they took up arms against British tyranny. 
From the colony of Virginia came the first president 
of the Continental Congress, and the Virginia members 
of that historic body were the proposers of the Declara- 
tion of Independence. In the Virginia conventions of 

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Tribute to Virginia 



the revolutionary period were evolved the principles 
which became the basis of the present federal structure. 
From Virginia came in Washington the arm, in Henry 
the trumpet, in Jefferson the inspiration of the Ameri- 
can revolution, the struggle which established for all 
the ages to come that indivisible fraternity of states, 
the American republic. From this state came the first 
suggestion of a confederation at the close of the revo- 
lution, and when the confederation had proved inade- 
quate, the proposal for a closer union which resulted 
in our present form of government. From this state 
came seven of the first twenty-one presidents of the 
republic. Upon its soil was witnessed at Yorktown 
the close of the revolution; at Bull Run and Appom- 
mattox the beginning and the end of the inevitable 
conflict which was to determine the destiny of 
the American Union. To the latter it gave leaders 
on each side who exemplified the consummation of 
all valor. Today, through this exposition in the vicin- 
age of old Jamestown, joined by the peoples of the 
earth, Virginia epitomizes its material progress, re- 
views the drama of three centuries and welcomes the 
representatives of an organization dedicated to the 
same high purposes of fraternity and progress that 
have illuminated its own pathway. 



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208 



CONTRIBUTIONS OF THE HEBREW 
PEOPLE TO HUMAN ADVANCE- 
MENT. 

DELIVERED BEFORE THE YOUNG MEN'S AND 

WOMEN'S CULTURE SOCIETY OF TEMPLE 

RODEPH SHOLOM, NEW YORK CITY. 

APRIL 25, 1906. 

I AM TO SPEAK on this occasion of the contribu- 
tions of the Judaic people to human advancement. 
It is a subject of especial interest and inspiration, 
not only to the Hebraic young men and women who 
compose the society before which I have the honor now 
to appear, but also to every friend of truth and justice, 
regardless of religion and nationality. Although of 
another belief and creed, I approach the subject of 
Judaic achievement with an appreciation of its immen- 
sity and sublimity, a consciousness of my incapacity 
properly to portray it, and with emotions of reverence 
and wonder. Although of another belief and creed, I 
address you not as an alien or as a stranger, but as a 
brother, friend and fellow-countryman, whose life is 
interlinked with yours in a changeless allegiance to 
the American flag — a flag representing the justice and 
the law which descended from God through your pro- 
genitors multiplied centuries ago — the flag emblemiz- 
ing the first government since the destruction of the 
Jewish nation by the Romans under which your peo- 
ple exercised complete and permanent prerogatives of 
citizenship. I address you as compatriots who form a 
fundamental element in the development of American 
institutions and the growth of American ideals. Your 
ancestors were among the first to join the pilgrimage 
which sought upon these shores a refuge from intoler- 

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Address at New York City 



ance and tyranny. In the life of the colonies, in the 
progress of the revolution, in the formation and ad- 
vancement of the republic they have been of such con- 
spicuous service as to transmit to you the true brood 
royal of American citizenship. Among the peoples of 
the American republic a kinship arises from the fact 
that a common desire to escape oppression and to es- 
tablish religious and civil liberty led them to this vir- 
gin hemisphere. In this fellowship you have an es- 
pecial right to share because the difficulties from which 
your fathers fled surpassed in severity and duration 
the miseries of all other peoples combined. 

When the American republic was established in 
1789, it is doubtful whether in any other country the 
Jewish people were admitted to unrestricted citizen- 
ship. During the 1,700 years that had elapsed since the 
close of their independent national existence and the 
final dispersion they had been the objects of oppres- 
sion and plunder. In France, although the Constituent 
Assembly had in 1791 decided to admit them to citi- 
zenship, and although the Sanhedrim summoned by 
Napoleon had proclaimed the abolition of all discrim- 
inations, it was not until the revocation of the oath 
More Judaico in 1839 that they secured complete po- 
litical and civil privileges. In the Netherlands, al- 
though they had enjoyed important concessions and 
extensive rights since the sixteenth century, they were 
not entirely disenthralled until 1815. In Austria, al- 
though partly emancipated by the Toleration Edict 
of Joseph II in 1785, they did not become citizens with- 
out restriction until 1867. In Germany they did not 
attain full citizenship until the adoption of the Consti- 
tution of 1849, nor in Italy until the collapse of the 
temporal power of the Pope in 1870. Not until 1848 
were they clothed with unqualified citizenship in 

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Address at New York City 



Greece, Sweden, Denmark, and other European states. 
Not until 1860 did they reach complete equality in 
England, nor until 1867 in Hungary. In eastern Eu- 
rope, notably in Russia and Roumania, they are still 
subjected to murderous prejudices and barbarous lim- 
itations. Thus it is hardly to be conceived that with 
all its modern enlightenment the world is yet suffi- 
ciently advanced to appreciate and to acknowledge its 
indebtedness to a people to whom during the greater 
part of history it has given darkness in exchange for 
light. 

It is neither necessary to the development of the 
subject nor possible within the limits of this address 
to trace the history of the Jewish people in detail. 
The history of the Jews is the history of the world in 
the largest sense. Of no other people can this be said. 
Every nation in existence when Abraham founded Is- 
rael has perished. No other people of that age remains. 
Succeeding cycles have witnessed the rise of empires 
that overran the earth, but these empires and their 
peoples have departed. Languages, religions, customs, 
nations, races, wars have thronged the centuries and 
with the centuries vanished. Yet today the Hebrew 
people form an important part of almost every nation 
in the world and have an identity as distinct as when 
Moses legislated and Samuel taught over 3,000 years 
ago. Not only are they a prominent element in al- 
most every modern nation, but they have also figured 
eminently in the life of almost every nation of the 
past. In the great movements of history they have 
formed notable and frequently commanding features. 
And yet they have never exceeded in numbers the 
smallest proportion, perhaps not more than 1 per cent 
of the world's population. In addition to this they 
have been continuously ostracised and outraged be- 

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Address at New York City 



yond all belief. What gave such vitality, such influ- 
ence, such cosmopolitanism to the Jewish people? The 
answer involves an inquiry into the cause, the charac- 
ter and the extent of their contributions to human ad- 
vancement. 

The primary contribution of the Hebraic people to 
the elevation of mankind was Abraham's proclamation 
of the one, the living, personal and omnipotent God. 
Fundamental as have been the changes that have swept 
through the 4,000 years of subsequent history this con- 
ception has never been questioned by the highest and 
purest thought nor shaken by pagan or infidel philoso- 
phy. Today civilization acknowledges and adopts it. 
The significance of this conception was due to its pure- 
ly spiritual character. Abraham, the founder of the 
Hebrew nation, was born in an age of kings and idols. 
Government was despotic and religion hopelessly ma- 
terial. Amid such surroundings Abraham lifted the 
standard of the spirit and taught the idea of a spiritual 
God. He supported this conception with a faith un- 
questioning and sublime, a faith that was necessarily as 
spiritual as the invisible God in whom it was reposed. 
In this teaching was the germ of human liberty. The 
God of the spirit was the only rightful king. The spir- 
itual fatherhood of God led inevitably to the spiritual 
brotherhood of man. It was but a short step from spir- 
itual to political equality. Under the leadership of 
Moses the religion of the spirit was given expression 
in the laws and customs of Israel. The Mosaic system 
contained a moral and legal code which is today the 
basis of civilization and government, a code which 
entered largely into the code of Theodosius, the laws of 
Charlemagne, of Ina and of Alfred. This system or- 
dained and taught the elevation of woman, the love of 
home, the sanctity of property and life, the observance 

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Address at New York City 



of the Sabbath, charity, fraternity, representative gov- 
ernment, systematic education, contempt for luxury 
and extravagance, equal rights and rigid justice. The 
prophets and sages who followed Moses elaborated 
these principles, teaching the beauty of truth and 
nature, the glory of righteousness, the consequence of 
sin, the vanity of riches and material power, the su- 
premacy of the spirit, the value of knowledge, uni- 
versal progress and universal peace. The schools 
founded by Samuel were the most ancient prototypes 
of the universities and public schools of modern times. 
As was said by Leroy-Beaulieu, the Jewish children 
"learned to read in the rolls of Thorah before the Latin 
alphabet was fixed, long before Cyril and Methodius 
had given an alphabet to the Slavs, before Runic in- 
scriptions were known to the Germanic races of the 
north." Agriculture was the chief occupation, love of 
home and liberty and knowledge the chief character- 
istic, spiritual development the chief aspiration of the 
Jewish people, a people whose principles and fortunes 
were embalmed in a literature which in the form of 
the old Bible is today universally revered as an im- 
memorial repository of divine inspiration and of the 
deepest philosophy and wisdom. This high degree of 
spiritual and political advancement was attained 
centuries before the advent of classic antiquity. 
Thus the Jews, beside whom "the oldest of old 
European nations are youthful," were the pioneers 
of history, literature, monotheistic religion, spiritual- 
ity and liberty. Thus the faith of Abraham was the 
fountain of human happiness, the foundation of human 
right. Thus the nation he established became the 
world's first self-governing commonwealth, a common- 
wealth that embodied the highest religious and civic 
ideals six centuries before Greece knew an alphabet and 

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Address at New York City 



more than a thousand years before the Latins founded 
Rome. In many of the upward movements of the world, 
the reformations, awakenings, revolutions, the Hebrew 
commonwealth has figured as a model and a light. Es- 
pecially is this true with reference to the American 
revolution. The colonial governments of New Eng- 
land, the home of the written Constitution, were con- 
structed on Mosaic lines, the criminal codes being 
taken almost bodily from the Pentateuch. As Mr. 
Straus so happily puts it, "Through the windows of 
the Puritan churches of New England the New West 
looked back to the Old East." From pulpit and plat- 
form throughout the colonies the Hebrew nation was 
lauded as the ideal republic. Arguments in behalf of 
independence and against all the doctrines of despot- 
ism were freely drawn from Judaic history and teach- 
ing. One of the most dramatic passages in Patrick 
Henry's immortal speech on American liberty — "Gen- 
tlemen may cry peace, peace, but there is no peace," 
came almost literally from the sixth chapter of Jere- 
miah. When on the day of the declaration of Ameri- 
can independence the Continental Congress appointed 
Franklin, Adams and Jefferson to prepare a seal for 
the United States, they selected for a device a rep- 
resentation of Moses watching the Red Sea as it en- 
veloped Pharaoh, beneath the picture appearing the 
words, "Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." 
The example of the Hebrew government was un- 
doubtedly one of the chief sources of the sentiment 
which inspired the American revolution and made 
possible the formation of the United States. Indeed 
the American republic in the spirit underlying its in- 
stitutions resembles the Israelitish commonwealth 
more closely than does any other nation in history. 
We have seen that the intellect and the soul were 

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Address at New York City 



the dominant elements in the original Hebraic char- 
acter, and that spiritual devotion to a spiritual God was 
reflected in a commonwealth whose chief pillars were 
liberty and learning. These characteristics made the 
Jewish people essentially the messengers and disciples 
of the spirit and enabled them to attain a mental and 
spiritual development which contemporary peoples 
could neither understand nor approach. It is true that 
certain philosophers and priests of other nations may 
have conceived the idea of one God before they knew 
of the Jewish teaching. But they did not permit this 
idea to reach and to uplift the masses. So extensive was 
the culture and so universal the faith of the Hebrew 
people that almost every Jew, whatever his position 
or occupation, was a custodian and a disseminator 
of Hebraic principles. To the worship of the spiritual 
God he added a loyalty to the Hebraic laws and cus- 
toms in which it found institutional expression. This 
devotion to the spiritual gave an identity and vitality 
to the Hebraic people which enabled them to survive 
captivities, devastations, national subversion and ages 
of agony and massacre. The consciousness of the 
indestructibility of the spirit made them superior to 
the tortures of the flesh. It made them gentle in peace 
and terrible in war. Their subjection was the most 
difficult task the legions of Rome ever attempted, it 
being necessary for the Roman empire to employ 
against them, small as they were in numbers, greater 
forces than against any other people. It is the philos- 
ophy of the spirit and the culture inseparable from 
it that explain the influence of the Jews on human 
progress. 

When the Phoenicians, who were the immediate 
neighbors of the Jews and of the same Semitic origin, 
became the colonizers, navigators and commercial in- 

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Address at New York City 



termediaries of the ancient world, the Israelitish tribes 
of Asser, Zebulun and Dan were their companions and 
emulators. These early mariners and traders estab- 
lished colonies throughout the known world. Al- 
though the life of the main body of the Hebrew people 
had been agricultural and domestic for many centuries, 
still as wars multiplied, as Palestine became more and 
more the battle ground of the nations, and as captiv- 
ities befell them, they began migrations to these Sem- 
itic colonies, especially to the settlements of their own 
bold tribesmen. A hundred years before the final 
destruction of Jerusalem Jewish communities were 
flourishing in almost every country. It is probable 
that with the Phoenicians they preceded the Hellenes 
themselves in Greece. The Jews founded colonies in 
Gaul in the days of the Roman republic. They set- 
tled on the northern shores of the Black and Caspian 
seas centuries before the Christian era and more than a 
thousand years before the Slavic clans laid the first 
foundations of Russia. They were so far in advance of 
the peoples by whom they were surrounded in religion 
and culture that they encountered prejudice and hos- 
tility from the beginning. The idolatrous masses 
around them had not been taught the sublime con- 
ception of a single deity. Thus the Hebrew people 
became the object of hatred and discrimination. They 
faltered not, however, in a sincere endeavor to advance 
the welfare of the countries in which they resided. 
They established schools for the study of religion and 
philosophy and law. At Alexandria the Hellenist Jews 
took a prominent part in the intellectual movement 
which made that city the successor of Athens as the 
world-capital of literature and thought and culture. 
They assisted in the revelation of Greek philosophy 
to the Roman world through the Neo-Platonic school, 

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Address at New York City 



one of whose foremost representatives was the Jewish 
thinker, Philo. Grammarian, rhetorician, musician, 
mathematician, scientist, literateur, philosopher, pa- 
triot, he was at once accomplished and profound. So 
familiar was he with Platonic thought that Suidas 
speaks of Philo as platonizing and Plato as philonizing. 
He was intensely loyal to his people and announced 
that the mission of the Jews was to teach a flawless 
conception of God and God's justice and to serve as 
the priests and prophets of humanity. 

We are now in position to observe that when the 
Jewish nation was finally destroyed in the year 70 A. 
D. and the Jewish people were dispersed throughout 
the world, they readily found homes and friends among 
their compatriots who had already established com- 
munities in almost every country. We are in position 
to note that their culture and spirituality aroused 
everywhere the enmity of peoples of different train- 
ing, customs and beliefs. As the barbarian inva- 
sions submerged civilization and the world sank into 
the shadows of the Middle Ages, this enmity assumed 
the form of severe legal restriction and violent per- 
secution. The hostile attitude of mankind as well 
as the spiritual character of his belief and his devo- 
tion to the laws of Israel isolated the Jew, concen- 
trated his life and aspiration within himself, and 
intensified the unity of the Jewish people. Thus the 
Jewish people, though scattered over the earth, re- 
mained in constant touch and preserved a wonderful 
uniformity in spiritual and intellectual development. 
The pressure of circumstance drove them to commerce 
and finance. Confiscation perpetually menaced their 
possessions and the only property they could safely 
own was that which could most easily be removed. 
The superb mental equipment resulting from centuries 

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Address at New York City 



of study soon gave them the mastery as traders and 
financiers. Thus the people who for more than twenty 
centuries had been anchored to the soil, and had de- 
veloped the highest standard of morality, religion and 
philosophy, whose prophets had taught the disregard 
of riches — a people composed of students, thinkers, 
metaphysicians and agriculturists — became by a cur- 
ious turn of fortune the chief cosmopolitans of the 
world and representatives of its most material forces. 
Thus the spiritual and the material were combined 
in the Hebrew people who had now become not only 
custodians of lofty standards of conduct and faith, and 
of the highest intellectual culture, but also guardians 
and sponsors of economic progress. In both capacities 
they have been of the very greatest service to mankind. 
During the Middle Ages, when Europe was engulfed 
in unlettered darkness, when violence and tyranny were 
predominant and the masses were strangers both to 
liberty and to knowledge, the Jewish people, despite 
unutterable difficulties, maintained for many centuries 
a continuous spiritual, intellectual and economic de- 
velopment, and preserved from extinction the highest 
elements of civilization. They established great 
schools, many of which attracted Christian clergymen 
and many of which became the foundations of Chris- 
tian universities. Notable among the Hebrew schools 
were those at Cordova, Toledo and Granada in Spain; 
at Beaucaire, Lunel and Narbonne in France; at Man- 
tua, Genoa and Rome in Italy; at Pumbaditia, Sura 
and Bagdad in the east. With reference to Jewish in- 
fluence in the east we may here recall the assertion of 
Schleiden, a scholar of prominence and ability, to 
the effect that what was best in the Koran was de- 
rived from the Jews. In illustration of the loftiness 
of the Hebraic character let it be said that the teach- 



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Address at New York City 



ers of these innumerable schools, attended in many 
instances by thousands of pupils from points both far 
and near, rarely accepted fees, but, on the other hand, 
frequently supported their pupils. Furthermore, these 
teachers were generally proficient in some commercial 
avocation. Civilization owes an infinite debt to the 
proficiency of the Jews in the study of languages. 
Having spread throughout the world at an early per- 
iod, having maintained constant communication 
among widely separated settlements, they became 
familiar with every tongue. In the darkest period of 
the Middle Ages there were few Jews, however poor 
or humble, who did not understand at least two lan- 
guages, and many knew from five to seven. Their in- 
tense devotion to the spiritual ideals of Jewish life and 
thought led them critically to study and faithfully to 
preserve the original Hebrew in which their ancient 
philosophers and prophets had spoken. It was Juda 
Ben Koreish who demonstrated that Hebrew, Arabic 
and Chaldean were of the same linguistic origin. The 
original Hebrew script had no definite vowel signs 
and was so difficult to read that it began to fall into 
disuse. The invention of a system of vowel symbols 
by the Assyrian Jews about 550 A. D. revitalized the 
Hebrew language and all subsequent study of the orig- 
inal Hebrew text of the old Bible has been based on 
the text arranged in accordance with this system. The 
Jews alone knew the Oriental languages, the ancient 
Greek and the western tongues at the same time. They 
were the founders of philology, one of the most im- 
portant branches of science, a study that has thrown a 
flood of light on primitive history. The Septuagint, 
the original Greek translation of the Old Testament, 
was the work of Alexandrian Jews. This was the 
version used by Christ and the apostles. The Jews 

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Address at New York City 



translated Aristotle and the other Greek philosophers 
into Latin and thus introduced the culture of Greece 
into the western world. Many of the most celebrated 
scholastics, notably Albertus Magnus and Saint Thom- 
as Aquinas, studied Aristotle and doubtless the other 
Greek philosophers in Latin versions based on the 
Hebrew translations. The original Hebrew text of 
the old Bible was one of the most significant and neces- 
sary factors in the Reformation. It is probable that 
Martin Luther obtained the chief inspiration of the 
Reformation from the study of the Hebrew Bible un- 
der Nicholas de Lyra, one of the closest students of 
Jewish literature. When the peoples of Europe had 
advanced sufficiently to appreciate the higher phases 
of existence, the Jews laid before them the intellectual 
and spiritual treasures of all the past. The Renais- 
sance and the Reformation, two of the most beneficent 
eras in human history, followed. But for the transla- 
tions of the Jews and the influence of their teachings 
the awakening of humanity might have been delayed 
for centuries. It is not surprising that the present 
century should number the Jewish scholars Benfey, 
Ollendorf, Brael and Oppert among its most noted 
philologists. In poetry and philosophy the Jews con- 
tinued through the gloomy ages to make a marvelous 
advancement which culminated as to the first in Geb- 
irol and Halevi in the eleventh, and as to the second in 
Maimonides in the twelfth century. Gebirol was a 
leader of independent thought. His principal work, 
"The Source of Life," was copied in many languages 
and influenced the learning of the time in no small de- 
gree. Of Halevi, Schleiden has said that he was not 
surpassed by Milton. Heine, who eight hundred years 
afterward succeeded to the fadeless purple of Halevi's 
genius, cried in ecstasy : 

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Address at New York City 



"Ah! he was the greatest poet, 

Torch and starlight to his age, 

Beacon-light unto his people, 

Such a mighty and a wondrous 

Pillar of poetic fire, 

Led the caravan of sorrow 

Of his people Israel, 

Through the desert of their exile." 

Halevi believed that God had scattered Israel 
through the world to proclaim the gospel of the spirit 
and that the long agony of the ages was a splendid 
martyrdom. Maimonides, the Jewish Aristotle, was 
the greatest philosopher of the twelfth century, and 
among the greatest of all time. Of his "Guide of the 
Erring" Scaliger has said that it could not be praised 
too highly. His writings were the basis of scholastic 
philosophy and the chief reliance of Spinoza. In medi- 
cine and natural science, which were not disassociated 
until after the seventeenth century, the Jews were un- 
rivaled. Until the advent of Europe's earliest medi- 
cal schools, Salerno and Montpelier, in the establish- 
ment of which they were mainly instrumental, the 
Jews were practically the only physicians in Europe. 
It was a most remarkable fact that princes who robbed, 
nobles who maltreated, and popes who excommuni- 
cated the Jews and even forbade them to practice medi- 
cine would have no other than Jewish physicians. The 
Jews were prominent in early exploration and astron- 
omy. About the year 800 Tabari discovered the re- 
fraction of light and made the first Arabic translation 
of Ptolemaeum. In the twelfth century John of Sevilla 
wrote an arithmetic in which for the first time ap- 
peared the use of decimal fractions, and they were 
probably original with him. In the thirteenth cen- 
tury the book Sohar taught "the revolution of the 
earth about its axis as the cause of night and day" long 

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Address at New York City 



before Copernicus. The astronomical tables of Al- 
phonse X., so long the practical guide of astronomers, 
were compiled under the direction of the Jewish Ben 
Sid about the middle of the thirteenth century. It was 
at this time that Hakohen divided the stars into the 
forty-eight star pictures. Ribeyra de Santos has said: 
"We owe to the Jews, more than to anybody, our first 
knowledge of philosophy, of botany, of medicine, of 
astronomy, of cosmography, as well as the elements of 
grammar and of the sacred languages, as well as nearly 
all studies of biblical literature." The Jews were 
among the first to take advantage of the printing press. 
They fostered all the more important industries, pre- 
serving the art of silk culture, of dyeing and of weav- 
ing. In commerce and finance they laid the founda- 
tions of modern political economy. In diplomacy and 
statesmanship they frequently rose by sheer ability 
to commanding spheres. The discovery of America 
was largely due to their assistance. The Jews San- 
tangel and Sanchez supplied Columbus with the neces- 
sary funds, relieving Isabella, who had already done 
so much to make the project a success and without 
whose co-operation it would have failed long before, 
of the necessity of pawning her jewels.* The maps 
used by Columbus were made by Cresques, a cele- 
brated Jewish astronomer and geographer, whose in- 
ventions alone made it possible for such a voyage to 
be undertaken. Bernal, the ship physician, and Marco, 
the surgeon, who accompanied the little fleet, were 

*In a recent speech in Congress the speaker repeated in 
good faith the popular error that Isabella had pawned her 
jewels to defray the cost of the expedition of Columbus. 
The part really played by Isabella, however, was sufficiently 
fundamental to justify the position the speaker was then as- 
suming. 



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Jews. It was a Jew, Rodrigo de Triano, who was the 
first of that immortal company to see land, and it was 
a Jew, Louis de Torres, an accomplished linguist, 
who in the capacity of interpreter went ashore to meet, 
as Columbus supposed, the Grand Khan of India, and 
who had the distinction of being the first of that mem- 
orable expedition to tread American soil. There was 
a dramatic significance in the part played by the Jews 
in the discovery of America. The decree expelling 
the Jews from Spain and the authorization of the pro- 
ject of Columbus were signed by Ferdinand and Isa- 
bella on the same day. And as the fragile squadron 
of Columbus, challenging the distance and the deep, 
began the bravest journey that sea or shore have ever 
known, a vessel passed laden with Jewish exiles who 
were leaving their homes in Spain forever. Little did 
these expatriated sufferers dream that at the very 
moment when earth's injustice seemed severest their 
brethren with Columbus were about to unlock the 
gates of another world where the Jewish people were 
destined to realize in peace and freedom their proudest 
ambitions, their purest ideals. 

By this time the malevolence of mankind toward 
the Jews had assumed a diabolic aspect. Edicts of 
expulsion were registered against them in almost all 
countries, and in those where there was no official 
expatriation they were loaded with restrictions. Con- 
fiscation and death perpetually threatened them. They 
had no rights which men or governments respected, not 
even the rights of life and property. They could not 
call their own the homes and other belongings they 
had acquired; these were deemed also the possessions 
of noble, bishop, king and lord. They could be taxed 
without limit. They were serfs and outcasts. They 
were the objects of insult and persecution. As a rule 

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they were excluded from military and political service, 
although when opportunity offered they demonstrated 
a wonderful capacity for both. Frequently they were 
massacred by hundreds and by thousands. The 
enginery of the inquisition was turned in fury 
against them. In certain places in England, Italy, 
Poland, France, Moravia, Austria, Spain they were 
exterminated ; in Strasburg, Mayence and Treves many 
were burned. They were blamed and punished for 
many of the great panics, famines and epidemics. In 
many cities they were confined in ghetto walls and 
locked and barred at night like criminals. In 1648 per- 
secutions began in Russia which have continued with 
accumulating horror until the present time. Thus the 
world with one hand accepted the torch of progress 
from the Jew and with the other assaulted him. 
The causes of this treatment, though originally re- 
ligious, were finally economic and political. As long 
as this hostility was purely religious it did not assume 
so pronounced and general a form of physical bar- 
barity. As mankind ascended from mediaeval gloom 
to higher spheres and a more complex civilization large 
classes became traders and financiers. They found 
the Jews their forerunners and their rivals and they 
invoked the enmity of governments and peoples for 
assistance in a competition in which they would have 
been otherwise at a disadvantage. It was a favorite 
habit with states and principalities to reimburse 
exhausted treasuries by extortion from the Jews 
through both threats and deeds of violence, confisca- 
tion and expulsion. Thus it was not Jewish greed for 
the gold of others that excited so much hostility, as 
has long been popularly supposed, and as Shake- 
speare intimates in his portrayal of Shylock, but the 
greed of others for the gold of the Jews. The excel- 

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lence of the Jew in the avocations most immediately 
connected with money was literally forced by the fact 
that all other avenues were practically closed and the 
fact that money was the only weapon with which he 
could maintain even a precarious security of property 
and life. The political character of these persecutions 
was due to the desire of rulers to divert popular at- 
tention from their own despotism and misgovernment. 
This was largely the case with the recent massacres in 
Russia, the only country with the single exception of 
Roumania that has not yet abolished the mediaeval 
restrictions and outgrown the mediaeval attitude with 
reference to the Jews. The cause of the common peo- 
ple of Russia is equally the cause of the Christian, the 
Jew, and of believers of all other sects and creeds. It 
is the cause of universal liberty. The recent massacres 
were evidently arranged in order to blind the people 
to the real sources of the nation's misery, to keep 
the Russian masses divided and oppressed, and thus 
to strengthen the autocracy. If it be said that they 
were apparently religious let it be remembered that 
the Russian church is inseparably united with auto- 
cratic government. These massacres would shame 
mediaeval assassins and they will inevitably evoke the 
anger of civilization and the chastisement of God. 

The fact that despite such difficulties the Jewish peo- 
ple remained throughout the dark centuries among the 
chief conservators of learning and made such mighty 
contributions to civilization is a remarkable tribute to 
their spiritual vitality. Nor is it surprising that in 
later times, as oppressions and persecutions multiplied, 
as the ghetto and the pale developed, millions lost the 
outer semblance of culture and surrendered to distres- 
sing conditions. We have seen that not till within 
the last 125 years have they obtained complete free- 

225 

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Address at New York City 



dom of citizenship and association in the nations out- 
side of Russia and Roumania, and that in these two 
countries they still suffer discrimination. The rap- 
idity with which they have entered the highest life 
of every country in which they have been emancipated 
and restored, the influence which they have exercised 
on the world's recent progress demonstrates how im- 
perishable is their hereditary and fundamental culture. 
They contributed through Spinoza and Moses Men- 
delssohn and Heine — Heine who easily takes rank with 
Goethe and Schiller — to the development of German 
idealism, one of the chief ornaments of modern thought 
and literature. They were prominent in the political 
and philosophical upheavals of the eighteenth and nine- 
teenth centuries. In war they have been no less con- 
spicuous. Massena, the Jewish marshal of Napoleon, 
recalled on historic fields the military genius of David 
and Judas Maccabeus. Without the assistance of Haym 
Solomon of Philadelphia, who gave $600,000 to the 
American cause and rendered other forms of service it 
is doubtful whether Robert Morris could have financed 
the American revolution. Manuel Noah and Isaac 
Franks were colonels on the staff of Washington and 
served with distinction throughout the Revolution. 
Major Nones rose from the ranks under Pulaski to 
head a legion under DeKalb. Judah Touro of New 
Orleans was of material aid to Andrew Jackson in the 
defense of that city. In the Mexican war General 
David de Leon made so splendid a record that he was 
twice thanked by Congress, and Lieutenant Seeligson 
was praised by General Taylor for valorous conduct at 
Monterey. At his death in 1862 Commodore Phillips 
Levy was the highest ranking officer in the American 
navy, and the following is written on his tomb at 
Cypress Hills : "He was the father of the law for the 

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abolition of the barbarous practice of corporal punish- 
ment in the United States navy." In the Civil War 
the Jews served on both sides with marked gallantry 
and credit. Frederick Kneffler enlisted as a private 
in the 79th Indiana Volunteer Infantry, rose rapidly to 
the rank of Brigadier-General, and was made Brevet 
Major-General for bravery at Chickamauga. In the 
Spanish-American war there were over 4,000 Jewish 
soldiers. Of these Sergeant Justh was the first man 
to die in the attack on Manila. According to Roosevelt 
himself the Jews among his Rough Riders were of the 
bravest of that celebrated band, one becoming a lieu- 
tenant. They were in the Astor Battery and fifteen 
went down with the Maine. They took part in every 
engagement, and the quality of their service is shown 
by the number of Jewish names on the lists of the 
wounded and the dead. 

Never have the versatility and value of the Hebraic 
genius been more clearly demonstrated than in the 
last one hundred years. In politics we find Lasalle 
breathing the German social democracy into existence 
and rivaling Bismarck. We find Lasker, the author- 
statesman, inaugurating the German Liberal Party and 
leading it in the Reichstag. We find Bamberger, the 
economist-historian, assisting in the formation of mod- 
ern Germany. We find Mannheimer president of the 
Austrian Diet, and Treier the speaker of the Danish 
House of Commons. In Turkey we find Pasha a Vice- 
Admiral of the Imperial Navy, and his brother the 
First Dragoman of the Imperial Palace. In Italy we 
find Maurogonata among the foremost senators and 
lawyers; Luzzatti, a conspicuous member of various 
cabinets; Wollemborg, Victor Emanuel's first Min- 
ister of Finance; Artom, an illustrious diplomat, the 
friend and counsellor of Cavour. In France we find 

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Benavrides one of the highest magistrates; Cremieux 
a famous minister and legislator; Fould four times 
Minister of Finance under Louis Napoleon; Gam- 
betta a defender of human rights; See, a champion 
of woman's education. In England we find Dis- 
raeli rising from the humblest surroundings to become 
for twenty-five years one of the most powerful figures 
in the world and Lord Herschel twice Lord High Chan- 
cellor under Gladstone. In the United States we find 
Judah P. Benjamin declining a Supreme Justiceship on 
account of his immense private practice, representing 
Louisiana with rare ability in the Federal Senate, serv- 
ing in the cabinet of the confederacy, and after the 
failure of the southern cause reaching England with 
shattered fortune at the age of fifty-one to become a 
leader of the English bar and to write a work on the 
law of sales that ranks as permanent authority. Ben- 
jamin once appeared against Webster in the United 
States Supreme Court. Webster occupied three hours. 
Then came Benjamin, physically small and insignifi- 
cant, who spoke in a thin, low voice for twenty minutes 
when the Chief Justice whispered to one of his col- 
leagues: "Great heavens, that little man has stated 
Webster out of court in twenty minutes." We find 
Isador Rayner, a worthy successor of Benjamin, in 
the present United States Senate. In the national 
House of Representatives we find our own incompar- 
able Mr. Goldfogle, Meyer, Littauer and Kahn. We 
find Franklin Moses Chief Justice of the Supreme 
Court of California, and Newburger, Cohen, Leventritt, 
Greenbaum, Steckler and others on the bench in New 
York. 

In other avenues we find the modern Jew pre-* 
eminent. In poetry we may point to Drachmann, 
whom competent critics have ranked with Tennyson 

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and Byron ; in fiction to Auerbach, to Bernstein and to 
Zangwill ; in dramatic literature to Klein, Millaud, Hal- 
evy, Schlesinger, Von Weilen, Rosenfeld, Belasco and 
Martha Morton; in dramatic art to Sonnenthal — the 
idol of Vienna — to Barnay, Braham, Rachel and to 
Bernhardt, the "queen of attitude"; in song to 
Lucca, Calve, Lehmann and Marcella Sembrich; in 
music to Mendelssohn — grandson of the great phil- 
osopher, Moses Mendelssohn, — Meyerbeer, Strauss, the 
Damrosches, Rubinstein and Hoffman; in painting to 
Israels, Solomon J. Solomon, Ulmann, Meyerheim, 
Lazarus and Ben Austrian ; in sculpture to Ezekiel and 
Antokalski; in writers of history to Edersheim, Herz- 
berg, Rowanin and Geiger; in political economy to 
Ricardo, Marx, Lasalle and de Bloch; in criminology 
to Lombroso and Max Nordau; in mathematics to 
Sylvester who with Cayler founded modern higher 
algebra; in exploration to Emin Pasha; in astronomy 
to the Herschels, to Goldschmidt, who discovered four- 
teen asteroids and thousands of new stars, and to Beer, 
who has been called the first cartographist of the 
moon; in medicine to Roller, discoverer of cocaine, to 
Virchow and Koch, the renowned specialists in tuber- 
culosis; in botany to Cohn and Pringsheim, who are 
among the first botanists of Germany; in finance to 
the Rothschilds, who perfected modern finance and 
popularized national loans; to Poliakoff and Pereres, 
the great Russian and French railway owners; in 
journalism to Pulitzer, to Rosewater and Ochs ; in dip- 
lomacy to Oscar Straus and Solomon Hirsch; in char- 
ity to Montefiore, to Baron and Baroness de Hirsch, 
Schiff, Nathan Straus and Mrs. Esther Hermann. It 
may be seen from this all too brief enumeration how 
few of these great names are connected with finance. 
The Jewish people retain in all its original vigor the 

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spirituality of old Israel. They are still devoted to the 
things of the spirit, and scholarship, philosophy, art, 
in fact, all intellectual studies are still their favorite 
form of energy. Let it be said to civilization's shame 
that of the eleven million Jews in the world more than 
half this number are still subjected in Russia and 
Roumania to the restrictions and oppressions of the 
dark ages. 

In this brief and necessarily incomplete discussion 
I have tried to outline the principal contributions of 
the Jewish people to human advancement. A com- 
plete description of their achievements would involve 
a review of the history of almost every important 
nation, both of the present and the past, and of the 
world itself. They have been patriots in the countries 
of their exile and adoption; cosmopolitans in almost 
every age. In the great transition periods, the move- 
ments for human elevation, they have played funda- 
mental parts. They have been the messengers of an 
idealism that has done much to advance loftiness 
in morals, equality in society, majesty in law. In 
philosophy, science, literature, finance, in general 
culture, in domestic virtue, in patriotism and philan- 
thropy they have been world-pioneers, world-coun- 
selors. In the preservation of their identity, vitality 
and refinement through centuries of cruelty and op- 
pression they have established an example which will 
give new strength and hope to inhumanity's victims 
everywhere. Recalling their marvelous record, a rec- 
ord of blessings for mankind, it seems unthinkable 
that death and torture and exclusion should have been 
their fortune through so many ages and that today 
they suffer ferocious discriminations in eastern Europe. 
This last condition is the foulest stain on our civiliza- 
tion, the darkest indictment of our time. How proud 

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the heritage of the Jewish young men and women! 
How inspiring the task which confronts them! With 
what purity and culture must they fill their souls and 
lives in order to keep unfurled and spotless the ban- 
ners of the spirit! With what courage must they de- 
fend the principles of equality and justice; with what 
devotion must they take up the cause of their bleeding 
brethren of the Russian and Roumanian captivities! 
May they continue to promote with every energy the 
welfare of the respective nations of their allegiance, 
to spread the teachings of the spirit, the ideals of 
intellectual and political freedom, of fraternity among 
nations as well as men, and thus bring nearer to hu- 
manity the realization of Isaiah's dream of universal 
peace. 



IF 



231 



ABRAHAM LINCOLN. 

SPEECH AT REPUBLICAN CLUB BANQUET, HOTEL 

WALDORF-ASTORIA, NEW YORK CITY, 

FEBRUARY 12, 1908. 

"For the first time in the club's history they called on a 
Democrat — and a Southern Democrat at that — to respond 
to the toast, "Abraham Lincoln." Congressman Sheppard 
was roundly applauded when he got up. He was still more 
enthusiastically cheered during the course of his speech" — 
New York Sun, February 13, 1908. 

"In introducing Congressman Sheppard, President Young 
said the committee in charge of the dinner, although rep- 
resenting a Republican organization, took the position that 
the fame of Lincoln had passed beyond sectional lines. 
Therefore, it had invited from that section of the country 
where Lincoln's acts were first the cause of violent con- 
troversy a representative differing in political faith, but not 
in loyalty to the government. At these words, as the Con- 
gressman arose to speak, there was a hearty demonstration 
from the diners, who joined with a will in the singing of 
the old rallying song of 'Dixie.' " — New York Tribune, Feb- 
ruary 13, 1908. 

ON THE wall of a Southern home there is today 
a letter in a frame, a letter which reads: 
"Executive Mansion, Washington, February 
10, 1865. Hon. A. H. Stephens: According to our 
agreement your nephew, Lieutenant Stephens, goes 
to you bearing this note. Please in return to select 
and send me that officer of the same rank, imprisoned 
at Richmond, whose physical condition most urgently 
requires his release. Respectfully, A. Lincoln." In 
a corner of the frame is a photograph of Lincoln 
on which appears his signature in his own 
handwriting. At the close of the Hampton 
Roads conference early in 1865 Lincoln had 
asked Alexander Stephens, Vice President of the 

232 



Abraham Lincoln 



Confederacy, if he could do anything for him per- 
sonally. "Nothing," said Stephens, "unless you can 
send me my nephew, who has been a prisoner on John- 
son's Island for twenty months.' "I shall be glad to 
do it; let me have his name," was the prompt reply. 
A few days later Lieutenant Stephens left for Rich- 
mond, where the exchange was effected, carrying the 
letter and the picture before described, both the gifts 
of Lincoln and for more than forty years they have 
remained the chief treasures of a Dixie fireside. This 
incident was but one of a host of others showing in 
Lincoln a spirit that poised on wings of light above the 
gloom of war. 

But for other and wider reasons it is proper that the 
portrait of Lincoln should adorn this Southern home. 
He was born of Southern parentage on Kentucky soil. 
His father was a Virginian; his grandfather was a 
Virginian; his mother was a Virginian. His mother! 
The very word hallows the lips that utter it. The 
world has not yet grasped its debt to the mothers of 
mankind. The mother is the luster and the hope of his- 
tory. From her bosom flow the impulses that fashion 
governments and alter civilizations. With whisper 
and caress she organizes parliaments, revolutions, 
epochs. She is the central figure of all human sac- 
rifice. Life is the flower of her agony, the fruitage 
of her pain. Humanity is cradled in her tears. That 
men may be she fronts the grave, yea, at each birth 
endures a living crucifixion. Lincoln's mother pos- 
sessed in emphatic measure the qualities that make 
maternity sacred. He never forgot her prayers, pray- 
ers that made the cabin in the wilderness a temple 
grander than St. Peter's or Cologne. The privations 
of the frontier soon crushed her tender life, and a few 
days before she died, her face already radiant with 

233 



Abraham Lincoln 



the ecstasy of heaven, she obtained from him a prom- 
ise that he would never touch inebriating drink, a 
promise that remained as sacred as her memory. His 
father, always in deepest poverty, had removed from 
Kentucky largely because the spread of slavery tended 
to degrade the status of the whites who were com- 
pelled to labor with their hands. Thus in his earliest 
years were impressed on Lincoln the ideas of lib- 
erty, equality and personal rectitude that led him 
later to acclaim that day the happiest in history when 
there should be neither slave nor drunkard in the 
world. Such was his mother's influence that he after- 
ward ascribed to her all that he was or hoped to be. 
The clumsy, hand-hewn coffin in which she was in- 
terred, the lack of ceremony, due to the fact that few 
ministers visited that remote vicinity, the lonely grave 
in the clearing, deepened the sadness that solitude and 
hardship had implanted in his nature. He did not rest 
until several months later he knelt in the snow while 
a wandering preacher, summoned at his instance, de- 
livered a funeral sermon at her grave. It should 
be said here that the devoted woman, a native of 
Kentucky, who succeeded Lincoln's mother in the 
Lincoln home, recognized at once his unusual capac- 
ities and employed every means to encourage and de- 
velop them. To her he gave a love and reverence that 
were reflected in his spotless conduct. The teachings 
of these two women gave gentleness and grace to all 
his acts and must have prompted deed after deed of 
mercy in the memorable conflict with which his name 
is forever associated. 

When Lincoln in 1832 announced his candidacy 
for the Illinois legislature he stated that the supreme 
purpose of his life was to win the esteem of his fellow- 
men by being worthy of it. Thus at the age of 23 

234 



Abraham Lincoln 



he proclaimed the basic impulse of his career, the ambi- 
tion to be useful to mankind. This impulse was but 
prophetic of the principle of brotherhood that was to 
mark the consummation of his efforts and to signalize 
his relation to history. Perhaps no other man of com- 
manding fame ever struggled so effectively against so 
unpromising an environment. The family had re- 
moved from Kentucky to Indiana, from Indiana to Il- 
linois, following the frontier's westward sweep, locat- 
ing in secluded forests, felling trees with which to con- 
struct the crudest shelter and clearing land for cultiva- 
tion. In the labors of the farm and woods young 
Lincoln shared to the fullest degree. The ordinary 
facilities of rudimentary education were beyond his 
reach. His entire schooling did not comprise twelve 
months. Yet he managed to obtain and study with 
absorbing eagerness Bunyan, Aesop, Weems' Wash- 
ington and the Bible. Perhaps Aesop inspired his 
celebrated habit of reinforcing argument with parable 
and anecdote. With what prophetic interest must he 
have followed the trials of Washington and the patriot 
armies in founding the nation he was to be summoned 
to preserve! He seems to have been especially im- 
pressed with Washington's unvarying trust in God, a 
sentiment he approved and emulated. To show his 
estimate of Washington let me cite an excerpt from his 
address on Washington's birthday at Springfield in 
1842: "Washington is the mightiest name of earth — 
long since mightiest in moral reformation. On that 
name a eulogy is expected. It cannot be. To add 
brightness to the sun or glory to the name of Wash- 
ington is alike impossible. Let none attempt it. In 
solemn awe pronounce the name and in its naked, 
deathless splendor leave it shining on." In the Bible, 
of which he was a constant student, he found the 

235 



Abraham Lincoln 



doctrine that supplied the definition of his existence, 
the doctrine embodied in Christ's reply to the lawyer 
in the temple, the doctrine of the fatherhood of God 
and the brotherhood of man, the doctrine that Lincoln 
considered of itself sufficient to form the basis of a 
church, the doctrine his life proclaimed and his death 
ennobled, the doctrine of which the American Declara- 
tion of Independence is but another form, the doctrine 
on which rests all liberty and progress. Such were 
the materials with which this youthful Vulcan ham- 
mered his being into heroic mould and purpose. In 
that stern pioneer age labor of severest form was hon- 
or's essence, equality was the natural state and men 
were loved for what they could contribute to the gen- 
eral good. In such a school Lincoln learned to revere 
humanity, truth and God. In such a school he developed 
a gentle soul, a giant stature and an iron will. His 
was a sympathy with all human aspiration. Hate 
found no lodgment in his heart; there kindness and 
mercy like twin Portias pleaded always against the 
pound of flesh. 

These elements were slowly fusing in the fires of 
experience and ambition, of conflicts, defeats, suc- 
cesses for almost thirty years from the date of his first 
announcement for office. His initial race resulted in 
disaster and without means, without profession, he 
wavered between the careers of lawyer and black- 
smith. In 1834 he was elected to the legislature and 
began preparation for the law, borrowing the neces- 
sary books and studying alone. Re-elected to the 
legislature in 1836, in 1838 and 1840, he took an im- 
portant part in framing the legislation of that forma- 
tive period, obtained a splendid training in practical 
statesmanship and parliamentary law and gave such 
evidence of leadership that he was twice his party's 

236 



Abraham Lincoln 



nominee for speaker. He continued the practice of 
law with signal industry for more than two decades, 
maintaining the highest standards and applying the 
doctrine of brotherhood to his profession. He be- 
lieved that the lawyer should discourage litigation, 
that the lawyer's true mission was the mission of 
peacemaker. During the early years at the bar per- 
sistent poverty and the death of the woman of his 
first love subjected him to severest melancholy. Chosen 
an elector on the Harrison ticket in 1840, on the Clay 
ticket in 1844 and canvassing his own and adjoining 
states in both campaigns, happily married in 1842 
and elected to Congress in 1846, he rapidly became a 
factor of more than state importance. His single term 
in Congress was marked by faithful service and several 
comprehensive speeches. He helped to make Taylor 
the Whig candidate for president in 1848, thereby 
contributing to that shrewdest of movements by which 
his party secured the political fruitage of the war it 
had so bitterly opposed. Another significant act was 
his bill to prohibit slavery in the District of Columbia, 
providing cash payments to owners voluntarily man- 
umitting their slaves. Already he was considering the 
idea of compensated emancipation which during the 
war he urged on Congress and the border states and 
which he never entirely surrendered. It was during 
this term in Congress that he wrote a letter to his 
young law partner containing certain rules of conduct 
which every young man ought to engrave upon his 
heart, a statement comprising a sounder and more 
helpful philosophy than any similar number of words 
in all literature, a statement breathing brotherhood in 
every line: "The way for a young man to rise is to 
improve himself every way he can, never suspecting 
that anybody wishes to hinder him. Allow me to as- 

237 



Abraham Lincoln 



sure you that suspicion and jealousy never did help any 
man in any situation. There may sometimes be un- 
generous attempts to keep a young man down; and 
they will succeed, too, if he allows his mind to be 
diverted from its true channel to brood over the at- 
tempted injury." In a speech a few years before he 
had expressed another phase of his love of humanity 
in this sentence: "If you would win a man to your 
cause first convince him that you are his sincere 
friend." There is a verse from Aleyn which elaborates 
this idea, an idea so illuminative of Lincoln's soul: 

"The fine and noble way to kill a foe 
Is not to kill him; you with kindness may 
So change him that he shall cease to be so; 
And then he's slain. Sigismund used to say 
His pardons put his foes to death; for when 
He mortify'd their hate he killed them then." 

Retiring from Congress, Lincoln devoted himself 
to the law until the repeal of the Missouri compro- 
mise in 1854 stirred the land almost to frenzy. Douglas, 
the brilliant Democrat from Illinois, had been chiefly 
instrumental in the repeal of the compromise which 
had been acclaimed as the solution of the slavery ques- 
tion. Lincoln and Douglas became the champions of 
conflicting theories, and in a series of remarkable de- 
bates employed every weapon of logic and exhausted 
every field of illustration. In his speech before the 
convention which nominated him for the United 
States Senate in opposition to Douglas, in the debates 
with that master of the forum, in inaugural addresses 
and presidential messages, on the field of Gettysburg 
and elsewhere Lincoln gave deliverances that in chaste 
and lofty eloquence, in simplicity and power stand 
unsurpassed. He was an earnest advocate of pro- 
hibition, canvassing the state of Illinois in its behalf 

238 



Abraham Lincoln 



and declaring that the liquor traffic was the tragedy 
of civilization. On the morning of his assassination 
he said to Major Merwin, with whom he had stumped 
Illinois for prohibition, that after reconstruction the 
next great question would be the overthrow of the 
liquor traffic. The rapid march of prohibitory senti- 
ment throughout the United States today shows with 
what prescience he spoke. The ideal of human broth- 
erhood was with him ever uppermost. Towards the 
south he exhibited on many occasions a tolerant spirit. 
In his famous speech at Peoria in 1854 he said: "Be- 
fore proceeding let me say I think I have no prej- 
udice against the southern people. They are just 
what we would be in their situation. If slavery did 
not now exist among them they would not introduce 
it. If it did now exist among us we should not in- 
stantly give it up. * * * When southern people 
tell us they are no more responsible for the origin of 
slavery than we I acknowledge the fact." The keynote 
of his position was resistance to the extension of slav- 
ery. In his speech at Cooper Institute in New York 
in February, 1860, he said : "Wrong as we think slav- 
ery is we can yet afford to let it alone where it is, be- 
cause that much is due to the necessity arising from 
its actual presence in the nation ; but can we while our 
votes will prevent it allow it to spread into the na- 
tional territory and to overrun us here in the free 
states?" He considered the Emancipation Proclama- 
tion necessary to the preservation of the republic. The 
maintenance of the Union as the chief hope of brother- 
hood and freedom was his predominating purpose. He 
cherished to the last the idea of compensated emancipa- 
tion. As late as February, 1865, when the south was 
prostrate, he presented to his cabinet a plan of pay- 
ment for manumitted slaves. His secretary, Nicolay, 

239 



Abraham Lincoln 



who probably understood him better than any other 
biographer, said that he never relinquished the idea 
and intimated a renewal of his efforts in this direction 
in his last public address. 

His election to the presidency and the opening of 
the American civil war made him the chief civic 
figure of the most colossal crisis in his country's life. 
Every element of his character was brought into 
instant and effective play. It is difficult to appre- 
ciate the task he met and mastered. His was 
the responsible supervision of all civil and military 
administration. The young party he had led to victory 
was naturally filled with numerous and discordant 
groups, all clamorous for recognition. Advocates of 
conflicting policies poured a stream of argument and 
protest across his audience chamber. To harmonize 
conflicting sentiments and interests required superb- 
est skill. Relations with other nations demanded the 
coolest judgment. He rewrote Seward's dispatch on 
the subject of England's recognition of southern 
belligerency, converting that violent document, which 
most probably would have incited foreign war, into 
a model of diplomatic propriety. The selection of 
commanders for the untried millions who assembled 
at his call involved the rarest penetration. Forbear- 
ance, sympathy and keenest insight marked his treat- 
ment of generals in the field. He studied the art of 
war and demonstrated a military talent of the high- 
est type. His orders and inquiries showed a tech- 
nical familiarity with all the problems of the contest. 
He grasped the essential features of the proper hand- 
ling of the Union arms and resource. From the begin- 
ning he foreshadowed the course of the strife with such 
accuracy that competent authorities have pronounced 
him one of the ablest strategists of that world-astound- 

240 



Abraham Lincoln 



ing war. Throughout the changing fortunes of the 
conflict he was the same serene, unyielding, all-compel- 
ling force. Modest almost to self-effacement he held 
himself the humblest of all the presidents. Of his 
second election to the presidency he said that there 
was in his gratitude to the people no taint of per- 
sonal triumph and that he felt no pleasure in suc- 
ceeding over others. He exercised the prerogative of 
pardon with tenderness and enthusiasm. Mighty as 
was his brain, still mightier was his heart. He had 
begun a humane and peaceful reconstruction of sev- 
eral states and had he lived the nation's wounds which 
he felt were also his would have far more quickly 
healed. The knowledge that despite his love for all 
mankind his efforts for human elevation would be 
distorted and assailed; that, however glorious the ul- 
timate victory, thousands of American homes were 
being desolated ; that brother was emptying the blood 
of brother and the premonition that he would not out- 
live the struggle wrapped him in isolation and sorrow 
and gave to his face a suggestion of sadness. 

His death was a profound calamity. To his wife 
he remarked as the assassin was about to fire, "There 
is no city I desire so much to see as Jerusalem." He 
was not permitted to see the old Jerusalem, but in 
a few hours he was to stand among the glories of the 
new. Now what is the relation of his life to the re- 
public he aided so materially to preserve? It is the 
development of the idea of brotherhood on which the 
existence of this Union depends. What lesson ema- 
nates from his spectral figure as it rises from that 
April night in 1865? It is the love of Abraham 
Lincoln for every man, woman and child beneath 
the American flag. Invoking his memory, I, a south- 
erner and a democrat, true to every principle that 

241 



Abraham Lincoln 



animates my people, come among you, northerners and 
republicans, equally loyal to your convictions, as fel- 
low-countryman, friend and brother. New York is my 
country as well as Texas. Massachusetts, California, 
Illinois are as dear to me as Louisiana, Georgia or Ten- 
nessee. The memory of Lincoln is one of the but- 
tresses of the reunited America of the twentieth cen- 
tury. In fulfillment of his desires and dreams the 
American people are today a mighty and a deathless 
brotherhood. Forgotten are the discords of the past; 
departed are the specters of civil strife. Near Colum- 
bus, Ohio, was situated Camp Chase, one of the mili- 
tary prisons of the north during the civil war. There 
thousands of southern soldiers died, far from the land 
of their birth and love. But their graves have received 
the tenderest care from northern hearts and hands and 
an arch has been erected on that solemn spot bearing 
the word "Americans." This word expresses the 
spirit of patriotism that today uplifts and thrills the 
nation, the spirit in which Lincoln moved and spoke 
and prayed. It hallows the past, it inspires the pres- 
ent and oh, may it animate the endless reaches of the 
future ! It arouses love for every part of our common 
country, for every city and every state, every mountain 
and every shore, every forest and every plain — love 
for our traditions and our history — love for the home of 
freedom, the hope of liberty, the light of time, the 
radiance of the ages — our own United States. 

"The poet sings of sunny France, 
Fair olive laden Spain, 
The Grecian isles, Italia's smiles, 
And India's torrid plain, 
Of Egypt, countless ages old, 
Dark Afric's palms and dates; 
Let me acclaim the land I name 
My own United States. 

242 



Abraham Lincoln 



The poet sings of Switzerland, 
Braw Scotland's heathered moor, 
The shimm'ring sheen of Ireland's green, 
Old England's rockbound shore, 
Quaint Holland and the fatherland 
Their charms in verse relates, 
Let me acclaim the land I name 
My own United States. 

I love every inch of her prairie land, 
Each stone on her mountains' side, 
I love every drop of the water clear 
That flows in her rivers wide; 
I love every tree, every blade of grass, 
Within Columbia's gates, 

The Queen of the earth is the land of my birth, 
My own United States." 



*F 



243 



SATIRE ON CONGRESSIONAL GARDEN 
SEED. 

SPEECH IN NATIONAL HOUSE OF REPRESENTA- 
TIVES, JANUARY 26, 1905. 

WHEN the agricultural appropriation bill was 
before the House during the last session I 
attacked the existing system of distributing 
vegetable seeds. I attempted not to destroy, but to 
improve the system — to restore the purposes which 
prompted its creation. I directed attention to the fact 
that the system had degenerated into an indiscriminate 
distribution of standard seeds without regard to the 
distinctive character of the various soils throughout 
the country. The Secretary of Agriculture had sim- 
ilarly described the situation in his annual report. 

The original object of the distribution was the de- 
velopment of the soil, the discovery of its adaptabili- 
ties. Manifestly it was a perversion of this object to 
send seeds suitable to a particular soil and climate into 
a section where different conditions obtained. For in- 
stance, the watermelon seed which went into my dis- 
trict last season produced watermelons so diminutive 
that they could be used for watch charms. Evidently 
these seeds were intended for a sterner clime. 

It is unnecessary to say that I was unsuccessful in 
the seed crusade. Cassandra never had a more un- 
sympathetic audience in foreshadowing the doom of 
Troy. I was a prophet without a people, an apostle 
without a following. It seems that the distribution of 
vegetable seeds is a permanent institution, an institu- 
tion which it is sacrilege to question and madness to 
oppose. As long as the republic lives senators and 
congressmen will, with the recurrent seasons, go forth 

244 



Satire on Congressional Garden Seed 

to sow, encouraged by the hope that succeeding elec- 
tions will bring in the sheaves, "some an hundredfold, 
some sixty fold, some thirty fold." The custom has 
the highest authority, for in Genesis we find that 
Egypt cried to Joseph, "Give us seed, that we may 
live and not die ; that the land be not desolate." 

Mr. LITTLE— Amen. 

Mri SHEPPARD— I acknowledge that in the en- 
deavor to reform this practice I have for the present 
failed. But, Mr. Chairman, the tragedies of history 
compose its most instructive chapters. The melan- 
choly note that rises from the harp of time is proof 
that in the sum of men's activities failure overbalances 
success and grief counterpoises joy. For every Soc- 
rates there is the hemlock, for every Oedipus the The- 
ban gate, for every Caesar the ides of March, and for 
every seed reformer a unanimous opposition. 

I know that the daughters of Pierus, who chal- 
lenged the Muses to a war of song and thrilled Parnas- 
sus with contending melody, were stripped of human 
form and attribute. I know that Niobe, asserting for 
her children a loveliness outrivaling divinity, offended 
heaven and having witnessed their destruction by the 
wrath divine, was changed to stone, remaining through 
all time a genius of woe, a patroness of tears. I know 
that Ixion boasted of the love of Hera and met a doom 
so horrible that the world still shudders at its relation. 

I know that the fathers of mankind, speaking a 
universal language, flourishing beneath the especial 
favor of Jehovah, began the construction of a tower 
on which they hoped to stand the equals of omnipo- 
tence, and that there fell upon them a confusion of 
tongues from which the race has not today recovered. 
I know that Pharaoh pursued departing Israel along 

245 



Satire on Congressional Garden Seed 

the pathway God had severed through the sea to find 
in the rejoining waters a prison and a grave. 

I know that Godfrey, Raymond, Tancred, Robert of 
Normandy, Hugh of Vermandois, and other lights of 
chivalry, other models of romance, all failed to drive 
the Moslem from the sepulcher of Christ. I know that 
Rienzi, last of tribunes, rising from that humble tavern 
on the Tiber, gaining supremacy through the people's 
confidence, subduing Orsinis and Colonnas, re-estab- 
lished domestic tranquility and foreign peace to drift 
into a tyranny more oppressive than that he had 
destroyed, to fall at the hands of the people he had 
liberated. 

I know that Robespierre, sinister contradiction; 
idealist; assassin; at heart a disciple of universal 
peace, in practice an advocate of universal murder; 
pointing with one hand to the God of love and with 
the other to the guillotine; attempting to turn the 
course of revolution to his own advantage, perished 
amid the jeers of the convention that had feared, the 
populace that had adored him. 

I know that Don Quixote charged the windmill on 
the plain of Aragon with disastrous results. I know 
that Sancho Panza, beneath whose mountainous pro- 
portions the faithful Dapple ambled into immortality, 
endeavored to conduct the fictitious government of 
Barataria and became a favorite subject for the ridicule 
of the world. 

I know that these adventures mark the possibilities 
of human daring and ambition. But, Mr. Chairman, 
not one of these exceeds in audacity or in hopelessness 
an attack on the distribution of vegetable seed in the 
American House of Representatives. 

246 



THE AMERICAN MOTHER. 

SPEECH IN THE NATIONAL HOUSE OF REPRE- 
SENTATIVES, JANUARY 10, 1906, PROTESTING 
AGAINST THE FORCIBLE EXPULSION OF A 
LADY FROM THE WHITE HOUSE OF- 
FICES AND GROUNDS. 

MR. CHAIRMAN : I have introduced a resolu- 
tion for an investigation of the recent violent 
expulsion of an American mother from the 
White House offices and grounds by executive of- 
ficials and employees while she was seeking an 
audience with the president of the United States. 
This resolution is not privileged, and unless 
the Committee on Rules, to which it was re- 
ferred, reports it I shall be powerless to secure its 
consideration. The incident which inspired this reso- 
lution recalled the darkest ages of the world. A lady 
of evident culture and refinement, an American mother, 
sought an audience with the president of the United 
States. She had every reason to feel that her cause 
would have just consideration from the man whose 
overwhelming popularity is largely due to his rever- 
ence of motherhood. She had every reason to believe 
that this sentiment would have been reflected in the 
conduct of the officials who surround him. Be this as 
it may, she had a right as an American citizen to seek 
redress for what she deemed a wrong, and if she was in 
error either as to the justice of her cause or as to the 
source from which relief might be obtained, she was 
entitled to courteous information. She was told that 
she could not see the president. Thinking that perhaps 
the president for the moment was engaged, and not 

247 



The American Mother 



being familiar with the rules regarding visits to the 
president, she announced that she would wait. 

MR. GROSVENOR— Mr. Chairman 

THE CHAIRMAN— Will the gentleman from 
Texas yield to the gentleman from Ohio? 

MR. SHEPPARD— Yes, sir. 

MR. GROSVENOR— Mr. Chairman, I make the 
point of order that the discussion of the resolution 
introduced and pending before the committee, and not 
reported, is hardly a proper subject at this time and 
not germane in any way to this question. 

MR. SHEPPARD— I think it is germane to the 
bill, and I will tell the gentleman why. I object to 
a tariff which erects a Chinese wall around the White 
House as well as around the United States. While I 
favor as great an exportation of commodities as we 
can have, I object to the forcible exportation of Amer- 
ican women who have personal business at the White 
House. Now, Mr. Chairman, I trust the gentleman 
will let me proceed. 

MR. GROSVENOR— Does the gentleman think it 
a proper subject of discussion? I have made the sug- 
gestion ; if he thinks it proper to arraign the president 
and his household, we'll let him go ahead. 

MR. SHEPPARD— What the country is arraign- 
ing is the spectacle of this woman's expulsion from the 
White House. 

MR. GROSVENOR— I have just made the sugges- 
tion to you. 

MR. SHEPPARD— If the president had heard the 
growl of a bear or the howl of a wolf, he would have 
been on the scene immediately, but the wail of a wo- 
man fell on unresponsive ears. 

Her ejectment was ordered and the indication of 
force overcame her sensitive temperament, frighten- 

248 



The American Mother 



ing her almost into hysteria. Then ensued an unequal 
struggle between this helpless and unoffending woman 
and powerful guards, in which she was barbarously 
handled. They dragged her across the muddy pave- 
ments, her clothing torn, her body bruised, and hur- 
ried her to the house of detention under an imputation 
of insanity which was found to be so absurd that she 
was immediately released. 

These unwarrantable and unnecessary brutalities 
demand investigation and merit censure. As for my- 
self, the memory of my departed mother would not 
permit me to rest until I had given expression to my 
indignation. Unless Congress takes some action we 
will soon witness in a free republic a condition where 
citizens can not approach the president they have 
created without fear of bodily harm from arbitrary 
subordinates. In the name of American womanhood 
and American motherhood I protest against this out- 
rageous action. It is a distinct lowering of the stan- 
dards of American manhood. It is a violation of the 
sentiment that lies at the base of American civiliza- 
tion, American liberty, and American progress — the 
reverence of woman. Without this sentiment the gov- 
ernment is an empty pageantry and the flag a lie. 
The lady should have been permitted to remain. She 
would doubtless have left of her own volition if the 
situation had been politely and properly explained. 
The presence of an American mother honors any place, 
although it be the audience chamber of the president 
of the United States. When the president steps into 
the presence of an American mother he is before his 
superior. This action of his subordinates should be 
investigated. Sir, it is impossible in words to measure 
the sacredness of motherhood. It is the sweetest note 
in the great anthem the ages chant to God, and the 

249 



The American Mother 



radiance of His infinite mercy is reflected in a mother's 
smiles, a mother's tears, a mother's prayers, a mother's 
love. 

"A mother's love 
If there be one thing pure, 
Where all else besides is sullied, 

That can endure 
When all things else have passed away, 

If there be aught 
Surpassing human deed, or word, or thought, 

It is a mother's love." 

Not until the tired hands that supported the cares 
of infancy and ministered to the developing years have 
been folded forever, not until the tired eyes grown dim 
and weary with the anxious vigilance of countless 
hours and endless days and nights that seemed eternal 
have closed in death do we begin to grasp the depth 
and tenderness of this mother love. 

If Congress, composed of American fathers, hus- 
bands, brothers, permits this incident to go unrebuked 
it will add a passive and cowardly approval of this 
violation of the most sacred principle of American 
life. In all the channels of human activity, in all the 
records of human martyrdom, self-sacrifice and valor 
the example of woman is unsurpassed by man. We 
need but mention the loyalty of Artemisia to the mem- 
ory of Mausolus, the devotion of Margaret Roper to 
Sir Thomas More, the affection of Eleanor for Edward, 
the heroism of Lucy Hutchison in the castle of Newark, 
the daring of Catherine Herman at the siege of Ostend, 
the fortitude of Lady Russell, the eloquence of Cor- 
nelia, the constancy of Madame Lavergne. The discov- 
ery of the American continent, on which have been 
wrought out the elemental problems of representative 
government, of practical science, and of every form 

250 



The American Mother 



of progress, the very existence of the American re- 
public, are due primarily to a woman. 

MR. PAYNE — Mr. Chairman, I rise to the point of 
order that the gentleman is not discussing the bill. I 
dislike to deprive the Democratic party of this new 
issue, but still I must insist that it is not germane to 
the discussion of this bill. 

THE CHAIRMAN—The point of order is raised, 
and if it is insisted on the chair will have to rule upon 
it. 

MR. PAYNE — I insist upon it or I should not have 
made it. 

THE CHAIRMAN—The chair is of the opinion, 
and finds himself sustained by former rulings, that in 
Committee of the Whole House a member must con- 
fine himself to the subject, but it has been universally 
held that in Commitee of the Whole House on the state 
of the Union a member need not confine himself to 
the bill or subject under debate. 

MR. PAYNE — I want to say that there are many 
rulings in that book to the contrary; that members 
must confine themselves to the bill under discussion, 
whether in Committee of the Whole House or in Com- 
mittee of the Whole House on the state of the Union, 
and it has been repeatedly so held. 

THE CHAIRMAN—The chair does not find any 
case in which a member in Committee of the Wholes 
House on the state of the Union has been required in 
general debate to confine himself to the bill under dis- 
cussion. 

MR. PAYNE— I have held that myself. 

THE CHAIRMAN—The chair will add that, as 
may be found in paragraph 885 of the Parliamentary 
Precedents of the House, on February 23, 1849, the 
question was squarely before the House in Committee 

251 



The American Mother 



of the Whole House on the state of the Union, and 
the Chairman, Mr. Hugh White, of New York, "held 
that, according to the universal usage, when the House 
was in Committee of the Whole House on the state of 
the Union all manner of matter was debated." An ap- 
peal was taken and the chair was sustained. There 
has never been a contrary ruling from that time until 
the present day. 

The chair finds that, according to paragraph 888, 
the House then being in Committee of the Whole 
House, not on the state of the Union, the gentleman 
from New York (Mr. Payne) made a ruling that in 
that committee members were confined to a discus- 
sion of the pending matter. It is, of course, so held in 
the House ; but in Committee of the Whole House on 
the state of the Union, in general debate, under the un- 
broken precedents of the last fifty years or more, the 
ruling has been uniform that all manner of matter 
may be debated. Of course, there are other ways in 
which a gentleman having the floor may violate rules 
and be out of order, but the chair is unable to sustain 
the point as to germaneness. The point would be good 
in Committee of the Whole, but not in Committee 
of the Whole House on the state of the Union while 
general debate is in progress. 

MR. PAYNE— Under the ruling of the chair the 
Democratic party will have an opportunity to discuss 
the new issue they have discovered. 

MR. SHEPPARD— But, Mr. Chairman, this is a 
nonpartisan question. My resolution provides for Re- 
publican and Democratic representatives upon the 
committee. I would favor a majority of Republicans 
upon that committee. Republicans are American citi- 
zens as well as Democrats. There is absolutely no 

252 



The American Mother 



division, for whether we are Democrats or Republicans 
we honor women. 

MR. PAYNE— Will the gentleman allow me to 
ask him a question? 

MR. SHEPPARD— Yes, sir. 

MR. PAYNE^-If the gentleman had as facts what 
he states in his speech, does he not think it would be 
better to present them in the police court than in the 
House of Representatives? 

MR. SHEPPARD— No, sir; a discussion of the 
dignity of the American woman is not out of place in 
the House of Representatives or anywhere else, and 
to suggest the police court is to cast a reflection upon 
the subject. I regret that the gentleman has en- 
deavored to prevent a discussion of this character, a 
subject on which we all meet with perfect unanimity. 

I shall not say very much further on this subject. 
I said that the every existence of the American republic 
was due primarily to a woman. If Isabella had not 
risked her personal fortune in support of the strange, 
almost fantastic, project of Columbus, no ships would 
have ever left the Spanish shore. And it is especially 
fitting that in a country which so largely owes its 
being and its progress to a woman's courage the love 
of woman should form the sublimest attribute of its 
people. The mothers of the race should be the objects 
of its most unselfish devotion. I trust that my resolu- 
tion will be adopted. 



^ 



253 



"IN GOD WE TRUST." 

SPEECH IN NATIONAL HOUSE OF REPRESENTA- 
TIVES, JANUARY 7, 1908, FAVORING RE- 
PLACEMENT OF THIS MOTTO ON 
NATIONAL COINAGE. 

(Before the end of the session, during which this speech 
was delivered, Congress passed an act permanently restoring 
the motto.) 

MR. CHAIRMAN : I rise without partisan feel- 
ing or purpose briefly to submit the reasons 
which prompted me to introduce at the open- 
ing of the present session a bill providing that the 
words, "In God We Trust" should be retained upon 
the coins of the United States. On recent issues of 
gold coins designed by the late Augustus St. Gaudens 
this striking sentence, so expressive of American rever- 
ence and faith, has been omitted by order of President 
Roosevelt. It may be interesting to refer here to the 
circumstances under which this motto was first in- 
scribed upon our coinage. In November, 1861, when 
the foundations of the republic were shaking, a Penn- 
sylvania minister warned the Secretary of the Treas- 
ury, Mr. Salmon P. Chase, that if the nation should per- 
ish no evidence of the religious faith of its inhabitants 
would be preserved upon its coins. Impressed by the 
minister's appeal, the Secretary of the Treasury, affirm- 
ing that no nation could be strong except in the 
strength of God or safe except in His defense, and that 
the trust of the American people in God should be de- 
clared on the national coin, requested the director of 
the mint to prepare a device "with a motto expressing 
in the fewest and tersest words possible this national 
recognition." It was discovered that legislation would 

254 



In God We Trust 



be necessary, as the act of January, 1837, prescribed the 
mottoes and devices for our coins. In April, 1864, in 
March, 1865, and in February, 1873, Congress enacted 
laws providing in substance that the words, "In God 
We Trust" might be inscribed upon such coins as 
would admit of such motto. 

Mr. Chairman, Congress ought not to permit this 
legend to be stricken from the coinage. The American 
people are fundamentally a religious people. They 
are distinguished by a devotion to religious and civil 
freedom. Perhaps every form of religious thought is 
represented among us and yet we are one in the recog- 
nition of a supreme and all-wise God. The oppor- 
tunity to worship the omnipotent Father according 
to the conscience of the individual is the basis of 
American history, the corner-stone of the American 
commonwealth. There is an essential relation be- 
tween God and freedom. Liberty as a permanent pre- 
rogative of the people was for all practical purposes an 
impossible conception before Abraham's proclamation 
of the one all-seeing God. After this proclamation men 
who had worshipped kings and idols came soon to 
realize that the God of the spirit was the only rightful 
sovereign. They came soon to understand that with 
the same spiritual Father men were brothers, both 
here and hereafter. It followed immediately that men 
were spiritual and political equals, and liberty, equal- 
ity, fraternity dawned upon the human race. Thus 
God is the source of liberty and religious freedom the 
basis of political independence. Voltaire, the scoffer, 
the satirist, but above all the analyst profound, ex- 
pressed this truth with evident application to the 
American republic when raising his withered hands 
above the grandson of Benjamin Franklin who had be- 
sought for the youth the aged philosopher's benedic- 

255 



In God We Trust 



tion, he whispered, "God and liberty." It was the 
idea of the one God and the resultant conception of 
human brotherhood that made the Hebrew nation the 
first self-governing commonwealth. It is of more than 
human import that the Hebrew commonwealth, em- 
bodying the ideas of God and liberty, was the chief 
example of the American patriots and that the United 
States, representing in the spirit underlying its insti- 
tutions the Hebrew nation more closely than does any 
other country, was the first government since the final 
destruction of Jerusalem, seventeen hundred years be- 
fore, under which the Hebrew people were admitted 
to unrestricted and co-equal citizenship. 

The beginnings of the United States were essen- 
tially religious, and a divine purpose may be seen in 
the events which made possible our country and its 
institutions. Surely there was omnipotent design in 
the fact that the invention of printing, the discovery of 
America, and the European Reformation took place 
within the span of a hundred years. The printing press 
brought the Bible to the people, and they rose from the 
serfdom of ages to stand before God as untrammeled 
children; before each other as brothers and as equals. 
With the Reformation began the movement to free the 
soul, the brain, the arm of man — a movement which 
culminated on this hemisphere in the Declaration of In- 
dependence and the Constitution of the United States. 
Despotism was assailed, and wars, commotions, per- 
secutions raged through Europe. That this movement 
might reach fruition in a new world undisturbed by 
the errors and oppressions of the old, God pointed the 
frail caravels of Columbus to these virgin shores. It 
was of more significance than even Columbus dreamed 
that on landing at Salvador his first act was to kneel 
upon the soil and dedicate the infant continent to the 

256 



In God We Trust 



King of Kings. Thus under the especial favor of 
Providence America began. I now propose to show 
that the finger of God may be traced in every crisis of 
American history and that the dominant note of Ameri- 
can character has been an unfaltering trust in the wis- 
dom and the justice of Omnipotence. 

It is worthy of remark that every effort to exploit 
this country for sordid ends failed utterly; the adven- 
turers in search of gold and notoriety came to grief. 
On the contrary, the valiant spirits who braved the 
trackless tides, the storms, the savages, the snows to 
establish in America a government of the free, who 
fled religious and political oppression to erect upon 
these shores the altars of religious and political liberty 
— the Puritan, the Huguenot, the Catholic, the Quaker, 
the Walloon, the Waldensian, the Covenanter, the Lu- 
theran, the Calvinist, the Dissenter, the Highlander, the 
Moravian, the Jew; in fact, the hosts of earth's exiled 
and earth's wronged — flourished here under difficulties 
so tremendous, such pestilences, famines, massacres, 
and dissensions, that their preservation and advance- 
ment can be attributed to no other source than the God 
whose worship they came to maintain in its original 
purity, whose freedom they were to transmit to pos- 
terity and eternity. Before commencing each day's 
work the colonists at Jamestown assembled in the 
little church to invoke the blessings of Jehovah. 
"Doubt not," they wrote their friends at home, "God 
will raise our state and build His church in this excel- 
lent clime." When in 1619 the house of burgesses, the 
first legislative body in America, was established in 
this colony one of its first resolutions was a recognition 
of God. When the little congregation of John Robin- 
son in the north of England was driven to Holland to 
become immortal pilgrims in the cause of liberty and 

257 

17 



In God We Trust 



truth, they were animated by a deathless trust in God. 
Before landing on Massachusetts soil, after leaving 
Holland, they paused to compose upon the Mayflower 
our first written constitution, and they began that re- 
markable document in the name of God. The first 
sentence summarizes the doctrines of God and freedom 
on which American institutions rest. Throughout 
colonial times the fires of faith and brotherhood were 
kept ablaze by Higginson, Hooker, Eliot, Mayhew, 
Williams, Davenport, Fox, Penn, Barclay, Keith, Whit- 
field, the Wesleys, Edwards, and other champions of 
an unshackled gospel, an unshackled manhood. They 
originated the religious revivals which have become so 
splendid a feature of American life. The first work of 
the first printing press in America, established in 1630, 
was a metrical version of the Psalms. 

The life of Washington, the buttress of the repub- 
lic in perilous emergencies, shows instance after in- 
stance of divine intervention. One of the most notable 
of these was his preservation during the slaughter 
of Braddock's troops on the Monongahela in the 
French and Indian war. So marvelous was his es- 
cape that he at once accredited it to the Almighty. 
Writing his brother, Augustine, he said : "By the all- 
powerful dispensation of Providence I have been pro- 
tected beyond all human probability or expectation; 
for I had four bullets through my coat, two horses 
shot under me, yet escaped unhurt, though death was 
leveling my companions on every side around me." 
Indeed, his survival excited universal comment. One 
of the foremost clergymen of the time, Rev. Samuel 
Davies, voiced the general opinion when he referred to 
Washington, in a sermon shortly after Braddock's de- 
feat, as "that heroic youth, Colonel Washington, whom 
I can not but hope Providence has hitherto preserved 

258 



In God We Trust 



in so signal a manner for some important service to 
his country." 

The first Continental Congress, with the assemb- 
ling of which the revolution morally began, was 
opened with prayer. On the second day the distin- 
guished body met under the disturbing influence of a 
rumored bombardment of Boston. Indignation was 
on every brow, sympathy in every heart. The thirty- 
fifth Psalm, wherein David recites his wrongs and 
cries out for the shield and buckler of the Lord, was 
read by the chaplain with such fervor and such effect 
that he broke into a thrilling prayer for the colonists 
and John Adams afterwards expressed the belief that 
heaven had ordained this passage to be read that 
morning. When the chaplain concluded there was the 
silence of death. Then rose Patrick Henry, and, under 
the impulse of that tremendous moment, exclaimed in 
part: "The distinctions between Virginians, Pennsyl- 
vanians, New Yorkers and New Englanders are no 
more. I am not a Virginian, but an American." 
With that sentence, inspired by more than human 
surroundings, the birth of American citizenship was 
complete, the germ of the American republic was 
in flower. During the following year Henry expressed 
a similar sentiment, when in his memorable address 
before the Virginia revolutionary convention he said 
that there was a just God who would raise up friends 
to fight the battles of the colonists and welcomed 
liberty or death. 

Ethan Allen crowded American history into a sin- 
gle sentence when he demanded the surrender of Ti- 
conderoga in the name of the Great Jehovah and the 
Continental Congress. On Cambridge Common, the 
day before Bunker Hill, we see the president of Har- 
vard praying among our troops. The colonists began 

259 



In God We Trust 



the American revolution with prayer, and before the 
war was over the British, too, had learned to pray. 
On assuming command of the continental armies, 
Washington expressed the most unqualified confidence 
in the Deity. So desperate was the situation at the 
outset of a struggle between a fledgling nation and 
one of the foremost powers of the earth, such the 
destitution, lack of discipline, lack of numbers among 
the colonials, that Washington wrote a friend in con- 
fidence: "We are now left with a good deal less 
than half-raised regiments and about 5,000 militia. 
* * * If I shall be able to rise superior to these 
and many other difficulties which might be enumer- 
ated, I shall most religiously believe that the finger 
of Providence is in it to blind the eyes of our ene- 
mies." Can we doubt the partiality of the Creator 
when we recall the unspeakable suffering, the disparity 
of strength, the bitter winters, the ragged uniforms, 
the bloody prints of shoeless feet, the poverty of state 
and individual, the inherent weakness of government, 
the treacheries and intrigues through which the patriot 
cause ascended to victory? 

Can we question the especial aid of the Ruler of 
All Worlds when we see the fog refuse to rise that 
August morning in 1776 until our army had retreated 
from almost certain annihilation on Long Island, and 
then some five years later observe the dawning day- 
light drive the escaping Cornwallis back to Yorktown 
and surrender? Can we deny the interposition of 
Divinity when in the gloomiest hours of the conflict 
we see the tattered continentals retreat barefooted 
over frozen roads, crossing, when almost overtaken, 
the Catawba and the Yadkin, whose waters succes- 
sively rose to delay their pursuers? Is it strange that 
after the decisive victory of Yorktown the Continental 

260 



In God We Trust 



Congress immediately proceeded to a church, and, after 
expressing public thanks to God, proclaimed a day of 
national thanksgiving, in which the entire country 
joined most fervently? Is it strange that Washington, 
on surrendering his commission, deemed it an impera- 
tive duty to commend the nation to the continued pro- 
tection of Omniscience? 

As the first act of Columbus on American soil was 
a recognition of Providence, it was remarkably fitting 
that nearly three centuries later the first act of the 
first Congress under the present system was to as- 
semble in a church and there unite in supplication to 
the Lord of all. In his inaugural address Washington 
had expressed his gratitude to heaven for the creation 
of the republic. Before the adjournment of that initial 
session Congress requested the president to recom- 
mend a "day of public thanksgiving and prayer, in 
acknowledgment of the many signal favors of Al- 
mighty God, and especially His affording the people 
an opportunity peaceably to establish a constitutional 
government for their safety and happiness." De 
Tocqueville, the French historian and philosopher, who 
wrote an accurate analysis of American character, ob- 
served after visiting the United States in the first half 
of the last century: "It never must be forgotten that 
religion gave birth to Anglo-American society." It is 
hardly possible to dissociate the miraculous growth 
of the American republic in population, in territory, in 
material and spiritual strength, in world influence and 
importance from the co-operation of an agency more 
than mortal. Especially is this true when we consider 
the questions of internal policy which, after threatening 
the existence of the country for seventy years, were 
not permanently settled until the altars of a reunited 
country had been christened in the blood of brothers. 

261 



In God We Trust 



When in the exciting hours of the Clay compro- 
mise of 1850 the strife of contending factions was an- 
griest, Benton, his turbulence for once subdued, said, 
concerning the solution of the pending problem: "It 
seems to be above human reason. But there is a wis- 
dom above human, and to that we must look." On 
leaving his home at Springfield in February, 1861, for 
the assumption of the presidency, when the signs of 
the storm through which he was to guide the imperiled 
nation were everywhere apparent, Lincoln voiced the 
traditional American trust in God when he said to 
the neighbors who had come to say farewell : 

"My friends, no one not in my position can appre- 
ciate the sadness I feel at this parting. A duty de- 
volves upon me which is perhaps greater than that 
which has devolved upon any other man since the days 
of Washington. He never would have succeeded ex- 
cept for the aid of Divine Providence upon which at 
all times he relied. I feel that I can not succeed with- 
out the same divine aid which sustained him. I hope 
you, my friends, will all pray that I may receive the 
same divine assistance with which success is certain/' 

Both sides in the appalling conflict which ensued, 
leaders and followers alike, Lincoln, Davis, Grant, Lee, 
McClellan, Jackson, and other mighty figures, ex- 
hibited a heroism in march and charge, in camp and 
cabinet, a devotion to truth as each conceived it, that 
could have proceeded only from unlimited faith in the 
Infinite Preserver. 

Both sides achieved eternal victories, the one hav- 
ing preserved a nation, the other having defied an- 
nihilation and challenged death for its conception of 
the right. When the assassination of Lincoln in 
April, 1865, had filled the world with gloom and 
dread and disturbances more violent than those of 



262 



In God We Trust 



war seemed imminent, we hear the voice of Gar- 
field as he lifts the American flag above the rioters 
in New York, "God reigns and the government at 
Washington still lives." Immediately the country 
caught the spirit of this appeal and another crisis 
had been mastered. It was about this time, at 
the culmination of the period which established the 
unity and permanency of the republic that Congress, 
as if by inspiration, ordered the sentence "In God We 
Trust," a sentence summarizing the history and reflec- 
ting the character of the American people, to be in- 
scribed upon the nation's coinage. For more than 
forty years it has there remained to remind us of our 
origin and the world of our faith. Who can doubt 
that its educational and ethical value has been im- 
mense? Who will not regret its displacement on cer- 
tain coins to make way for the Gaudens design, a de- 
sign which shows on one side a woman in savage 
head-dress, on the other a Roman eagle in predatory 
flight — the one side a degradation of woman, the other 
a eulogy of war? 

It is particularly appropriate that the inscription 
"In God We Trust" should appear upon our national 
moneys. The coinage of a country is the most concrete 
and universal evidence of its sovereignty. Is it not fit- 
ting that this elemental expression of government 
should contain a recognition of the power to which 
the government owes its foundation, its growth, its 
glory? Again, the coinage is, as a rule, the first and 
most general token of government with which Ameri- 
can children and foreigners seeking our citizenship be- 
come familiar. It enters fundamentally into the peo- 
ple's lives and thoughts and hopes. It is the vitaliz- 
ing element in commerce, society, and government. 
Bearing the words "In God We Trust," it would sug- 

263 



In God We Trust 



gest to every child and every citizen the genius of 
American institutions ; it would lead every foreigner to 
study American ideals in the light of a proper philos- 
ophy. It is a poor time to remove this motto when 
economic disaster shrouds the land, when the suc- 
cessful and the rich of yesterday are the suicides and 
paupers of today. For the reasons enumerated I 
believe, Mr. Chairman, that the beautiful and stately 
sentence "In God We Trust," so symbolic of American 
history, American aspiration, American faith, should 
be permanently inscribed upon the coinage of the 
United States. And permit me, sir, to express the firm 
belief that the eye of God is watching the American 
fleet as it speeds today through distant seas beneath 
strange suns and stranger stars, and that if we are 
destined, contrary to our desires and prayers, to meet 
in combat the foremost heathen power of the globe, 
the God of Washington, of Lincoln, and of Lee will 
again crown the American arms with victory. 



If 



264 



A TRIBUTE TO OLD AGE. 

DELIVERED IN NATIONAL HOUSE OF REPRESEN- 
TATIVES, MARCH 22, 1910. 

MR. CHAIRMAN, I was very much interested 
during the early course of this debate in 
the discussion of the question of old age as 
applied to clerks in the various departments of the 
government. While listening to the statements of 
the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Gillett) in 
response to inquiries by the gentleman from Illinois 
(Mr. Madden), the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. 
Gardner), the gentleman from South Dakota (Mr. Mar- 
tin) and others regarding the advisability of attempting 
by law to establish an age limit for those who serve the 
government, it occurred to me that in the noisy on- 
sweep of an intensely material era we were perhaps 
not sufficiently familiar with the capabilities of age. 
Indeed, sir, it has become too much a habit in recent 
years to disregard and put aside our older men and 
women. The clamor against old age, not only in the 
departments of the government, but in nearly all the 
other activities of the world, is senseless and unjust. 
This fact I hope to demonstrate in the short time 
now allotted to me. The idea has become too prev- 
alent that after a certain age, by no means advanced, 
a man's usefulness diminishes as his years increase. 
A celebrated physician — Doctor Osier — expressed the 
opinion only a short while ago that the effective work 
of the world is done between the ages of 25 and 40. 
A more colossal error could hardly have been made. 
The impression has become entirely too general 
that our older men and women obstruct rather than 
facilitate the march of civilization. The truth is that 

265 



A Tribute to Old Age 



the world owes infinitely more to men above the age 
of 50, an age ten years beyond the Osier limit, than to 
men below it. Some two years ago an analysis was 
made by a scholar of accepted standing, Mr. Newman 
Borland, of the lives and achievements of 400 foremost 
characters of human history. This analysis, to which 
I am indebted for many of the names I am about to 
present, showed that nearly 80 per cent of the world's 
greatest figures closed active lives between the ages of 
50 and 80 ; 35 per cent continuing beyond 70, 22 1-2 
per cent beyond 80, 6 per cent beyond 90. Let us con- 
sider what has been achieved by men beyond the age 
of 80. Titian, master of Venetian painting, whose 
colors reflected the freshness and enthusiasm of a 
world saluting the return of art, produced many of 
his most wonderful canvases after 80, painting his 
famous Battle of Lepanto at the age of 98. Fonte- 
nelle, one of the most versatile of men; Cornaro, 
the disciple of temperance; Pope Leo XIII, John 
Adams, Theophrastus, strode into the nineties with 
intellectual vigor unimpaired. Michel Angelo at 89 
still held the sky a prisoner in his brush, having exe- 
cuted his Last Judgment, perhaps the most famous 
single picture in the world, and his frescoes in the 
Sistine Chapel between 60 and 70. See Von Moltke 
in full uniform at 88, still the chief of staff of the 
Prussian army, having crushed France at 72. Hear 
John Wesley 

MR. KELIHER— -May I interrupt the gentleman? 

MR. SHEPPARD—In one moment. Hear John 
Wesley preaching with undiminished eloquence and 
power almost every day at 88, still directing the great 
religious movement he had founded, and closing amid 
unceasing activity at that remarkable age one of the 
most remarkable careers of his time, having traveled 

266 



A Tribute to Old Age 



250,000 miles in an age that knew neither electricity 
nor steam, delivered 4,000 sermons, composed hun- 
dreds of volumes covering almost every phase of litera- 
ture, earning through his publications $150,000, every 
cent of which he gave to charity during his life. I now 
yield most cheerfully to the gentleman from Massa- 
chusetts (Mr. Keliher). 

MR. KELIHER— I desire to ask the gentleman 
from Texas if he can tell us how old the Speaker of 
the House was when he outgeneraled the House re- 
cently. 

MR. SHEPPARD— He is now nearly 74. Whether 
the Speaker outgeneraled the House or not on that 
particular occasion, he is a conspicuous instance of 
the accomplishments of age, and I shall refer to him 
later. See Guizot and Hobbes and Landor with active 
pens at 87. See Talleyrand and Thomas Jefferson, 
Herbert Spencer, Newton, and Voltaire, all fruitful 
in the eighties. See Bancroft, Buffon, and Ranke 
writing history after 80. See Palmerston, prime 
minister of England at 81, and John Quincy Adams, 
stricken in the fullness of his strength on the floor of 
Congress at the same age. Tennyson's Crossing the 
Bar, the tenderest death song in our language, was 
composed at 83, Goethe's Faust at 80. See Glad- 
stone conducting one of his most exciting political 
campaigns at 80, taking control of a nation and becom- 
ing its premier at 83. See Cato learning Greek; Plu- 
tarch, Latin ; and Socrates, music, all at 80, and tell me 
no more that the old are no longer capable of high and 
useful achievement. 

But let us proceed. Think of Joseph Jefferson 
portraying Rip Van Winkle with added effectiveness 
at 75, or the Irish actor, Macklin, taking part in 
a performance in England at 99. Think of Browning, 

267 



A Tribute to Old Age 



brilliant and complex as ever at 77, or Whittier and 
Bryant issuing new volumes at 79. Think of Grimm, 
Laplace, Lamarck, completing tremendous tasks in the 
neighborhood of 80. Think of Perugino, at 76, paint- 
ing the walls of a cathedral, or Humboldt deliber- 
ately postponing until 76 the best work of his life, his 
immortal Kosmos, completing it at 90. Think of Gali- 
leo discovering the daily and monthly vibrations of 
the moon at 73. Think of Irving and Lamartine, Hugo 
and Holmes, Wordsworth and Longfellow, Hallam 
and Grote, George Buchanan and Samuel Johnson, 
Kant, Savigny and Littre, all astounding mankind with 
masterful productions between 70 and 80. Think of 
Henry Clay, Calhoun, Metternich, Bismarck, Crispi, 
Thiers, Franklin, Morgan, Reagan, Roberts, Allison, 
Morrill, Cannon, all towering figures in politics after 
70. Think of Commodore Vanderbilt increasing the 
mileage of his railroads from 120 to 10,000, adding a 
hundred millions to his fortune between 70 and 88. 

Turning to the period from 60 to 70, the list 
grows still more interesting and comprehensive. To 
this decade belong the best deductions of Confucius; 
Bismarck's inauguration of a colonial career for Ger- 
many; Pasteur's discovery of a cure for hydrophobia; 
Monroe's famous doctrine for the protection of the 
South American republics, the permanent safeguard 
of a continent's liberties ; the third and fourth voyages 
of Columbus, resulting in the discovery of South Amer- 
ica ; and many of the brightest deeds of Webster, Bea- 
consfield, Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, 
and Martin Luther. To this period belong many of 
the world's most splendid paintings. In music some 
of the rarest fabrics of Wagner, Haydn, Verdi, and 
Gounod are the fruitage of this period. In general 
literature, philosophy and science many of the most 

268 



A Tribute to Old Age 



imposing performances have been by authors be- 
tween 60 and 70. Prominent among these we find 
many of the best compositions of Cervantes, Schopen- 
hauer, Hugo, John Stuart Mill, Berkeley, Mommsen, 
Voltaire, Ruskin, Emerson and Francis Bacon. Espe- 
cial mention should be made of Michelet's history 
of France, Dryden's ode on St. Cecilia's day, Mil- 
ton's Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes, Ed- 
mund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France, 
and Sir Richard Burton's translation of Arabian 
Nights, a source of delight to every English-speaking 
fireside. 

Coming now to the deeds of men between 50 and 
60 we find many of the most far-reaching of all 
history. Between 50 and 60 Columbus made 
his first voyages of American discovery, perhaps 
the most important single events in human records; 
Marlborough won Blenheim, Morse invented the tele- 
graph, Richelieu reconstructed France, Caesar cor- 
rected the calendar and wrote his commentaries, Crom- 
well established the protectorate, Lincoln issued the 
emancipation proclamation, Bright instituted his re- 
forms ; Loyola founded his great society, Jefferson the 
Democracy; Knox acomplished a great religious revo- 
lution; Wyclif and Luther translated the Bible and 
brought its eternal truths to the hearts and hearths of 
the English and German masses ; Schliemann made his 
most notable excavations ; Hunter gave a fundamental 
impetus to surgery; Kepler contrived his table of 
logarithms, Chesterfield his system of social ethics, 
Hegel and Lotze their systems of philosophy ; Leibnitz 
founded the Academy of Berlin, Penn negotiated his 
famous treaty with the Indians, Washington became 
the first president of the United States, Robert E. Lee 
made the confederate resistance sublime, Herschel in- 

269 



A Tribute to Old Age 



vented the reflecting telescope, Canning and Peel per- 
formed their most brilliant labors, Burke devised his 
India bill and secured the impeachment of Warren 
Hastings, Garibaldi became the ruler of Italy. 

Between 50 and 60 Leidy made his most valuable 
contributions to biology, Cuvier to natural history; 
Copernicus wrote his treatise on the revolution of 
celestial bodies, Adam Smith his Wealth of Nations, 
the foundation of modern political science. Between 
50 and 60 Plato and Aristotle gave their principal cre- 
ations to the world. Between 50 and 60 Kant wrote 
the Critique of Pure Reason, Bacon the Novum Or- 
ganum and Locke the Essay on the Human Under- 
standing, each of these three works being veritable 
pillars of modern learning. Between 50 and 60 were 
written Bunyan's Holy War and the second part of 
Pilgrim's Progress, Boswell's Life of Johnson, De 
Foe's Robinson Crusoe, Dante's Divine Comedy, 
Milton's Paradise Lost, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, 
the first part of Cervantes's Don Quixote, the 
second part being written after 60; La Fontaine's 
Fables, Gulliver's Travels, all treasures that will en- 
rich the literature of the world forever. The average 
age of the Chief Justices of the Supreme Court of the 
United States, perhaps the greatest legal tribunal on 
earth, is nearer 70 than 60, Marshall having concluded 
his prodigious labors of more than three decades at 
80, Taney at 88, Waite at 72, Fuller still presiding over 
that august body today at 76. It is safe to say that the 
average age at which all the more than fifty associate 
justices who have occupied the supreme bench since 
its organization were still in the full exercise of their 
functions is nearer 65 than 60. 

Such is a partial list of the achievements of men 
who have passed the half-century mark. Eliminate 

270 



A Tribute to Old Age 



these achievements and you would blot out most of 
the world's advancement. Observe that we are still 
ten years above the Osier limit of 40. Were we to go 
still further, and erase the deeds of the "infants" be- 
tween 40 and 50, we would destroy about all that re- 
mains of human progress. We would have to elimin- 
ate the printing press of Gutenberg, the discoveries in 
electricity of Franklin and Galvani, Priestley's dis- 
covery of oxygen, the small-pox preventives of Jenner, 
Harvey's discovery of the circulation of the blood, La 
Salle's discovery of the Mississippi, Bessemer's process 
for the manufacture of steel, Watt's steam engine, 
Stephenson's railway, the military feats of Grant and 
Sherman and Cromwell and Nelson, Blackstone's Com- 
mentaries on the Principles of English Law, the ser- 
vices of Washington in the American Revolution. In 
science, music, art and literature we would wipe out 
almost all the surviving contributions to human en- 
lightenment; among these the conceptions of Her- 
schel and Von Baer, the compositions of Liszt and 
Spohr, the creations of Dore and Rubens and Blake, 
many of the masterpieces of Shakespeare, Scott, 
Gibbon, Hume, Macaulay, Carlyle, Petrarch, Pope, 
Dickens, Chateaubriand, Lessing, Spurgeon, Dumas, 
Milman, Motley and Gray. This incomplete review 
will show that our older men are by no means 
to be despised ; that we owe to them what is most per- 
manent and uplifting in the civilization of the world. 
It shows that a man rarely reaches the full fruition of 
his powers until he enters the forties and the fifties, 
and that as long as life throbs within his bosom he is 
capable of service to mankind, that "age is opportunity 
no less than youth itself." 

In the words of Mr. James Q. Howard, one of the 
most gifted officials in our Congressional Library, him- 

271 



A Tribute to Old Age 



self an example of the possibilities of age, a man is as 
a rule "immature, unripe, callow, vealy, verdant, sappy, 
bumptious, bat-blind, and grass-green until he reaches 
the age of 40 years." I repeat that there has been of 
late too much of a disposition to neglect and disregard 
the old. I would not deprecate the encouragement of 
young men and women. They have a high mission to 
fulfill ; but the old need encouragement as well ; affec- 
tion and solicitude are as welcome to their twilight 
years as to the radiant hours of the young. Beneath 
gray locks may blaze the fires of genius; perhaps a 
gentle word may awake in feeble eyes the vision of 
an eagle. Society in its adulation of mere youth is 
falling into serious error. Such an attitude is a con- 
tradiction of the truth of history, a violation of all the 
teachings of experience. There are advantages of which 
age alone may boast. The passions that lashed the early 
years now lie obedient at the feet of reason. The im- 
pulses that stirred the youthful soul to violence and 
sin are sleeping in the cradle of a mature philosophy. 
No more does anger break in curses on the lips or envy 
hiss its shameful whispers. Revenge no longer 
prompts the uplifted arm; on the venerable counten- 
ance there broods prophetic peace. 

The weaknesses of men and governments stand out 
in startling contrast with the ideals experience alone 
develops and age alone may understand. Contem- 
plation imparts a glory to the furrowed brow as in the 
silent sunset of a noble life the storms and follies of 
the world become mere distant echoes. Society must 
learn again that services of unmeasured value may be 
rendered by the old. It must learn again that in 
neglecting the old it is wasting one of its most valu- 
able assets. It is the general complaint of students of 
human institutions that each generation repeats in 

272 



A Tribute to Old Age 



large measure the blunders of former ones, it being 
evident that if each generation could begin at the exact 
point in knowledge and experience where the other 
left off the progress of the world would be won- 
derfully accelerated. This complaint would have far 
smaller basis if we but learned to heed and love and 
glorify our older men and women. 

And after all old age is but a fiction ; there is no old 
age of the soul. 

"The hands of youth are smooth and beautiful 
And round and finely formed and white and cool. 

But I have known two old and twisted hands, 
With knotted veins and fingers bent with work; 

No grace of form is left those wasted frames 
Wherein the hidden grace of life doth lurk. 

But thin and old and cramped, they on them bear 
The marks and signs of those who struggle much; 

The patient strength of all the earth is theirs, 
And tenderness untold is in their touch. 

The hands of youth are smooth and white with ease, 
But God hath clasped such twisted hands as these." 

O, sir, let the crusade against our older men and 
women cease. The world needs and heaven conse- 
crates the ripened wisdom of the mellow year. 



vF 



273 

18 



THE MARQUIS OF MONTROSE. 

ADDRESS BEFORE A LITERARY SOCIETY. 

THERE is an attraction in misfortune that at times 
fascinates men of marked sensibility and makes 
them martyrs in causes with which they are 
unconnected by ties of natural affection or by material 
interest. Some such charm the pale and placid brow, 
the "mild voice and mournful eyes," of the first Charles 
Stuart exerted over the impulses, the passions and the 
destinies of two striking characters — the Marquis of 
Montrose and the Earl of Strafford. Were another 
Plutarch to arise he could find no more instructive or 
pathetic parallel than the lives of these two men who 
employed their wonderful energies in averting for a 
season the ruin of the Stuart race — in supporting for a 
time like human caryatids the tottering Stuart throne — 
and who died on the block and the gibbet for those 
who neither appreciated nor understood them. 

It is with regard to the former of these, the Mar- 
quis of Montrose, that I desire to speak. 

James Grahame, Marquis of Montrose, was born in 
a seaport town of Forfarshire, Scotland, in the early 
part of the seventeenth century. The place of his birth 
is one of the most romantic spots in Scotland. It 
was the ancestral seat of the family of Montrose. 
It was on the shore of the German ocean. From 
this place and across these waters Douglass departed 
on his fatal pilgrimage with the heart of Bruce. To 
the northeast was Dundee, consecrated by tradition — 
the home of Claverhouse. To the southwest was mem- 
orable Aberdeen, the scene of Macbeth's expiation, 
of Donald's death, of Bruce's valor and Murray's tri- 
umph. And this triple inspiration of nature, history 

274 



The Marquis of Montrose 



and tradition left an impress on the soul of the young 
Montrose. 

He received a liberal education and completed his 
studies on the continent. Returning home in 1635, the 
twenty-third year of his age, he found Scotland an- 
gered and aroused over the announced intention of 
Charles the First to establish in that country the Eng- 
lish system of Episcopal church government and the 
English liturgy. When three years later Scotland 
broke into open hostility Montrose signed the Cove- 
nant and took an active part in the suppression of 
English sympathizers and in the repulsion of the royal 
army. In 1639 he was one of the covenanting leaders 
who visited Charles on the border to arrange the 
treaty of Berwick. 

Here he met Charles in person. What passed be- 
tween them has never been ascertained. But through 
some strange influence Charles won him. Thereafter 
Montrose was a devoted supporter of the decaying 
Stuart cause. In the next year Charles again invaded 
Scotland, and Montrose, on account of his prominent 
position among the Covenanters, was compelled to op- 
pose him. But his actions became so suspicious that 
his loyalty to Scotland and the Covenant was chal- 
lenged and he was imprisoned for a while by the domi- 
nant Presbyterian party. Shortly afterward civil war 
burst out in England. This war was the culmination 
of the struggle between the Commons and the Crown 
which had begun centuries before. Practically all 
Scotland opposed the Crown. As the contest intensi- 
fied it became evident that Charles was doomed. In 
1644 at Marston Moor his fortunes received a fatal 
blow. 

It was about the middle of this year that Montrose 
quit his home in Forfarshire, where he had been since 

275 



The Marquis of Montrose 



he left the jail, and joined Charles at the royal camp 
in England. He insisted on being allowed to invade 
Scotland. Permission was given. Receiving the title 
of Marquis from Charles he set out with only a thou- 
sand men, all of whom deserted before reaching the 
frontier. 

In disguise and with but two companions he made 
his way to the Highlands. Gathering a few clans that 
rallied to his summons, and with some Irish who had 
crossed the sea to aid him, his forces amounting in 
all to but fourteen hundred men — he began the strug- 
gle which has made his name so widely celebrated in 
the annals of war. With a handful of inexperienced, 
ill-armed and half-clad followers he swept Scotland 
like a whirlwind. Unimpeded by the severities of a 
Scottish winter, traversing almost impassable regions 
with astonishing rapidity, falling like a thunderbolt 
upon forces that frequently more than thrice doubled 
his own, he terrorized and almost mastered Scotland. 
His achievements are said to have been equaled but 
twice in subsequent history, by Napoleon at Montene- 
gro and by Jackson in the valley of the Shenandoah. 

But each day that augmented his success dimin- 
ished his resources. After each victory the High- 
landers, whose predatory instincts made them impa- 
tient beneath the restraint of a regular campaign, re- 
tired to the fastnesses of their mountain homes to en- 
joy the spoils of war. Thus Montrose was finally left 
with a few Irish, who, on account of the distance of 
their country, were compelled to remain. Stripped 
of almost every resource he was forced to abandon the 
strife and flee for safety to the continent. There his 
fame preceded him. He was received with praise and 
adoration, the German emperor conferring upon him 
the rank of Mareschal of the Empire. 



276 



The Marquis of Montrose 



In 1649 Charles the First was executed and in the 
same year Montrose, made captain-general of Scot- 
land by the young Charles Stuart, collected a few fol- 
lowers and attempted a second invasion of Scotland. 
Unable to hold his forces together and destitute of 
supplies he became a fugitive in the land of his birth. 
While in the disguise of a peasant in the house of a 
supposed friend he was betrayed. To consummate 
his humiliation, his captors received word from Charles 
Stuart treacherously disclaiming knowledge of or con- 
nection with his rash invasion. 

His captors, bitter and implacable, brought him to 
Edinburgh. They subjected him to every indignity 
and condemned him to the gibbet. That he was con- 
demned to die was not surprising. It might have been 
expected, for at that time defeat meant death and 
political parties settled controverted issues in pitched 
battle with bullets for ballots. But the brutality that 
marked the treatment of the fallen and harmless Mon- 
trose was without excuse. 

During the morning of the day of his execution 
a storm of unusual violence was raging over the city, 
but when the death cart left the prison the thunder 
slept and the sunlight clothed the last scene of his 
fateful life with glory. He was carefully toileted and 
richly clad. His dignified and impressive bearing, his 
fearless glance, his serenity and his majesty imposed 
silence on the multitude as it had on the storm. The 
miscreants who had been hired to stone him felt the 
missiles drop from their nerveless hands. And so 
modestly and so bravely did the great Marquis ap- 
proach his death and martyrdom that the curses of his 
enemies were turned into prayers, their insults into 
tears. 

277 



The Marquis of Montrose 



"A beam of light fell o'er him, 
Like a glory round the shriven, 
And he climbed the lofty ladder, 
As it were the path to heaven." 



«F 



278 



A TRIBUTE TO BOOKS. 

EXTRACT FROM AN ADDRESS ON EDUCATION. 

BOOKS are a universal currency coined from the 
mints of thought in every age and country. 
Books are the only general means by which 
we may know and study the habits, customs, ambi- 
tions, joys and woes of ages that are past and peoples 
that are dead. Books are monuments that immortalize 
alike the glory and despair in every human experience. 
Books are of far greater service to mankind than all 
the material achievements of this wonderful time. 

The forces of electricity and steam transport us 
from continent to continent, but they cannot take us 
to the England of Elizabeth, the Greece of Pericles, 
or the Rome of Nero. They bring us messages on 
threads of fire from distant lands, but they cannot 
bring us messages from the voiceless dead. Through 
books we may converse with the great of every age. 
We may with Alexander pass the Indus in his earth- 
conquering career and weep with him because he 
could not subjugate the stars. We may accompany 
Napoleon from Corsica to St. Helena. Caesar will 
relate the deeds of Gallic wars and we may see death 
resting like a stricken eagle on his brow as he lies 
at the base of Pompey's statue. We may stand with 
Cicero in the Roman forum and watch the thunder 
on his lips obey the lightning in his eye. Cleopatra 
will tell us of her love for Antony and Antony will 
picture Cleopatra's charms for which he flung the 
crown of half a world away. We may sweep from 
the forests of the north into the valleys of the south 
with Attila and Alaric. We may wander with the 
mighty dead through all the mighty past. 

279 



A TRIBUTE TO TEXAS. 

ANNUAL BANQUET, TEXAS CLUB, HOTEL PLAZA, 
NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 21, 1910. 

WHEN Cortez, but thirty years after the first 
voyage of Columbus, vanquished Monte- 
zuma and established in Mexico as a part 
of the Empire of Charles V. the government of New 
Spain, the Rio Grande was its northern limit. Tales 
of treasure in the land beyond this river excited 
the avarice and fancy of the invader. It was 
whispered that within this region were the seven 
cities of Cibolo with fabulous riches and enor- 
mous populations. Thus, almost one hundred years 
before the first settlements appeared on the Atlantic 
shore of North America, while the wildernesses that 
were to become New York, Virginia and Massachu- 
setts were reposing in the silence of creation's morn- 
ing, Texas was known as a land of mystery and charm. 
When in 1536 Cabeza de Vaca and the other three 
survivors of the attempted subjugation of Florida, 
after wandering along the Gulf coast and through 
Texas, reached Mexico to relate a story of privation 
the world obtained its first definite information of 
the country across the Rio Grande. Through a cen- 
tury and a half Coronado, De Soto, Onate, Castillo, 
Mendoza and others penetrated various portions of 
the trans-Rio Grande, attaching it to New Spain, but 
no permanent occupancy was effected. The tempo- 
rary establishment of a French colony by La Salle in 
1685 near Matagorda Bay and the fear of further 
French aggression aroused the Spaniard to the neces- 
sity of locating Spanish settlements in Texas. But a 
strange paralysis fell on Spanish energy. For the next 

280 



A Tribute to Texas 



130 years, while the other colonies of North America 
were enjoying rapid growth, Texas was practically 
unoccupied and undeveloped. Beyond the erection of a 
few missions, some of which still stand as monuments 
of neglected opportunity, the Spaniard failed to em- 
ploy any measure that might have made Texas an in- 
tegral part of the Spanish empire. So feeble were the 
colonizing efforts of Spain that when the influx of 
American citizens into Texas began there were but 
three small settlements between the Sabine and the 
Rio Grande — San Antonio, Goliad and Nacogdoches. 
The failure of Spain successfully to settle Texas for 
nearly 300 years is one of the most astounding facts 
in history. Spain had inherited the colonizing instinct 
from Rome — Rome, whose methods of conquest and 
settlement had unified the world in a single system of 
administration. The Spanish emperor traced his scep- 
ter to the Caesars. Spain itself had been a Roman 
province. Its generals and governors had been 
schooled in Roman practices and methods. The leth- 
argy of Spain in respect to Texas is explainable on no 
human hypothesis. Destiny kept the Spaniard to the 
south of the Rio Grande. God preserved Texas for the 
American citizen, the American Union and the Ameri- 
can flag. 

The achievement of Mexican independence in 1821 
gave great impetus to American settlement in Texas. 
The conception of the masterful plan of American col- 
onization, its approval by the Mexican government in 
an hour of domestic turbulence are due to the pa- 
tience, the courage and the genius of Moses Austin 
who planted the germ of American institutions in the 
soil of Texas. The execution of the plan was be- 
queathed to Stephen Austin, his immortal son, who 
administered the original and typical colony with such 

281 



A Tribute to Texas 



firmness and fairness as to secure the permanency of 
American occupation. From the advent of the Austins 
the history of Texas becomes the Iliad of a race of 
heroes. Without the labors of the Austins San Ja- 
cinto would have been a barren victory. The Texan 
pioneers came not for gold, for plunder or adventure, 
but for homes, accepting in good faith the guarantees 
of the Mexican government for the protection of prop- 
erty and life. They were the sentinels on the outposts 
of American civilization, the frontiersmen of liberty, 
and an instinctive appreciation of their position made 
them great in thought and deed. When tyranny be- 
came intolerable they wrested Texas from its grasp, 
giving to freedom another citadel, to history a new 
illustration of sacrifice and valor. Again the Teuton 
faced the Latin in the struggle for world-dominion 
and Teutoburger forest in San Jacinto found another 
sequel. The tragedy of the Alamo, the massacre of 
Goliad are the heritages of eternity. The names of 
Houston, Travis, Crockett, Bowie, Fannin, Milam and 
all the others from whose blood a new republic rose 
will be cherished wherever freedom has a temple or 
glory a shrine. 

The republic of Texas assumed its place among the 
nations and exercised for a decade the prerogatives 
of independence. Governed efficiently at home, rep- 
resented ably abroad, the beginnings of a great civili- 
zation were laid. Nurtured in recollections of the 
heroism with which the autonomy of Texas was 
achieved, a sense of nationality inseparable from its 
soil — a patriotism as wide as its boundaries, as lofty 
as its mountains, as limitless as its plains has been 
implanted in every Texan and deepening with the 
years makes the* division of our state unthinkable for- 
ever. There is one Texas, and but one, today and on 

282 



A Tribute to Texas 



the everlasting morrow of the centuries — the Texas 
christened in the fires of revolution, cradled in the 
storms of battle — the Texas of the Red, the Sabine, 
the Gulf, the Rio Grande — not one inch of whose ter- 
ritory will we ever yield or consent to its mutilation 
for any purpose that political ambition or sectional 
intrigue may suggest. After ten years of national 
existence Texas became a part of the American Union. 

The progress of Texas is amazing. Its popula- 
tion has increased from 818,000 in 1870 to 3,050,000 in 
1900. It challenges Missouri for fifth place in popula- 
tion among American commonwealths although Mis- 
souri became a state a quarter of a century in advance 
of Texas. In 1840, fifty years after it became a state 
and after more than two hundred years of permanent 
settlement, New York had a population of 2,450,000. 
In 1840, fifty years after it became a state and after 
more than 175 years of continuous occupancy, Penn- 
sylvania had a population of 1,750,000. In 1900, but 
little more than fifty years after it became a state and 
only 85 years after its permanent colonization had 
begun, Texas had a population of over 3,000,000 — be- 
ing in relative growth practically a century ahead of 
the two most powerful and populous states of the 
American Union. 

From 1840 to 1900 New York, the first state today 
in numbers in the Union with the largest city of the 
western hemisphere — the second city in the world — 
grew from 2,450,000 to 7,300,000, increasing three- 
fold. From 1840 to 1900 Pennsylvania, the second 
state today in numbers in the Union, with the third 
largest city on the continent, the ninth in the world, 
grew from 1,750,000 to 6,300,000, increasing four-fold. 
From 1840 to 1900 Illinois, third state today in num- 
bers with the second largest city in the Union — the fifth 

283 



A Tribute to Texas 



in the world — grew from 480,000 to 4,825,000, increas- 
ing ten-fold. From 1840 to 1900 Ohio, fourth state to- 
day in numbers with several of the largest cities of the 
country, grew from 1,520,000 to 4,200,000, increasing 
nearly three-fold. From 1840 to 1900 Texas, without a 
city of as many as 100,000 people, grew from 212,500 to 
3,050,000, increasing nearly fifteen-fold. When it is 
noted that the states of New York, Pennsylvania, 
Illinois and Ohio are the most highly developed regions 
of the Union, the centers of manufacture, wealth, 
finance and distribution, with industrial enterprises 
conducted on prodigious lines, with railroads travers- 
ing every section of their respective territories, and 
that Texas, devoted mainly to agricultural and pastoral 
pursuits, is in but an elementary stage of economic 
growth, with less than 25 per cent of its land in culti- 
vation, with a comparatively small portion of its area 
intersected by railways, the ratio of miles of railway 
to square miles of territory being but one to twenty- 
six, although the actual mileage is exceeded by only 
one or two other states, that in these four leading 
states the density of population ranges from 86 to 150 
to the square mile, while in Texas the proportion is not 
much more than twelve to the square mile, we begin 
to grasp the significance of this showing. 

But there is more. Texas holds the leadership in 
cotton, producing one-fourth the crop of the United 
States and twice as much as any other state. In 
cattle its supremacy is unquestioned. In 1899 only 
four states exceeded Texas in the value of its agricul- 
tural products and only one in the value of its domestic 
animals. In both respects Texas is now most prob- 
ably first or will soon become so. The taxable values 
of the state have increased from fifty millions in 1850 
to two billion and three hundred millions in 1909. 

284 



A Tribute to Texas 



The last few years have seen a general awakening in 
the state on the subject of diversified farming. The 
idea of diversification has been exploited to such an 
extent that northern and eastern buyers are troop- 
ing to Texas to compete for its growing out- 
put of vegetables and fruits. A public educational 
system supported by an enormous fund, state, denom- 
inational and private colleges of accepted excellence 
provide intellectual training of the most thorough and 
progressive nature. 

Great, however, as have been the achievements of 
Texas, they are but whispers of its possibilities. The 
star of the present fades before the aurora of the future. 
With an area of 265,000 squares miles, the largest of 
American states, its potentialities are measureless. 
It is in economic and commercial infancy. It has 
barely pronounced the first letter in the alphabet of its 
progress. Extending through fourteen degrees of long- 
itude and more than ten of latitude, it comprises shore 
and plain and mountain, the three representative in- 
habitancies of man. Almost every people of impor- 
tance in the world may find Texas a reproduction of 
their native land. Its climate varying from temperate 
to sub-tropic, adjusted to the gradual elevation from 
the Gulf line to the scarp of the Llano Estacado and 
the summits of the trans-Pecos, gives health to the 
citizen and luxury to the soil. 

Practically every crop of benefit to man may be 
grown in Texas. Practically every variety of product- 
ive soil lies within its boundaries. It may easily dupli- 
cate the cotton, oat, the corn and wheat yields of 
the Union. Cotton may be produced in almost every 
portion of its domain. The Llano Estacado, described 
till recently in the geographies as the great American 
Desert and popularly supposed to be a waste of sand, 

285 



A Tribute to Texas 



is a region of unquestioned fertility. The Gulf coast 
will ultimately be devoted to rice and fruit and a large 
section of East Texas to the production of tobacco 
of the finest Cuban aroma. The soil of the Brazos 
Valley, an alluvial deposit some 300 miles in length, 
perhaps the richest of the river basins of the state, all 
of which have an exhaustless fecundity, reaches a 
depth of 50 feet as it approaches the Gulf. In the Red 
River Valley, where grows a cotton with fiber of such 
special quality as always to command a distinctly 
higher price than the ordinary staple, are six contigu- 
ous counties, by no means completely settled, remote 
from extensive markets, whose farm tonnage already 
exceeds that of any similar area in the country, except 
in some four or five of the older states, where large 
cities create an exceptional demand for truckage and 
stimulate intensive farming. 

In minerals as well as agricultural products 
Texas possesses a limitless supply. In the moun- 
tains of the trans-Pecos gold, silver, copper, lead, 
zinc, iron, graphite, mica, asbestos, manganese and 
kindred ores are known to exist. Many of these 
metals are also found in the central mineral region 
of Llano, Mason and adjoining counties. Extend- 
ing from the Brazos to the Red are immense beds 
of clay impregnated with copper assaying in some 
localities from one to four per cent. The iron ore de- 
posits of east Texas, from which gun barrels and other 
munitions of war for the confederate service and 
the ornaments for the pillars of the Texas capi- 
tol were made, contain limitless masses of the metal 
on which modern progress is builded. In the Llano 
region are Bessemer ores of surpassing grade. Large 
beds of asphalt lie in Anderson, Montague, Uvalde 
and other counties. Clays for building brick, paving 

286 



A Tribute to Texas 



brick, earthenware, stone ware, tiling, and for porce- 
lain of the most delicate composition are widely dis- 
tributed. Salt is found abundantly in different 
portions of the state. The oil of Beaumont and Cor- 
sicana is justly famous. The Fayette sandstone, the 
shell limestone of Austin, the marbles, granites, por- 
phyries, the lustrous serpentines and other ornamental 
stones of Llano, Burnet, San Saba and the trans- 
Pecos rival in beauty and utility the quarries of Ver- 
mont and Cairo, the brocatelle of the Pyrenees, the 
Numidian of Algeria, the carrara that prisons the 
skies of Italy. 

Such is a partial review of the elementary resources 
of the state. The plentitude of raw material is 
apparent. One commodity I have omitted until 
now in order to emphasize the fact of its abound- 
ing existence. It supplies the one remaining ele- 
ment necessary to industrial development, the ele- 
ment of fuel. In this respect, as in all others, Texas 
is infinitely provided. The coal fields of the state are 
divided into the three bituminous basins of north cen- 
tral Texas, of Eagle Pass, and of Presidio county, 
while the brown coal and the lignite extend from Red 
River east of the prairies across the state to the Rio 
Grande, a distance of over 400 miles. It is reliably 
estimated that the north central bituminous field con- 
tains a thousand square miles of workable deposits, 
"each of which is underlaid by 2,500,000 tons of coal." 
The extent of the brown coal and the lignite is almost 
beyond computation. The bituminous coal is an ex- 
cellent fuel, and it has been shown by actual demon- 
stration that the Texas brown coal is equal to the 
celebrated brown coals of Austria, Bohemia and Hun- 
gary and similarly adaptable for all household and in- 
dustrial purposes. It should be added that the coal 

287 



A Tribute to Texas 



fields are so widely distributed as to make possible 
the industrial development of those sections of the 
state least susceptible to agriculture. Manufacturing 
has already begun in Texas, the value of the total pro- 
duct in 1905 being nearly two hundred millions. 

It is evident, therefore, that Texas is entirely able 
to support the needs, supply the wants, and occupy 
the energies of as large a population as it may be 
practicable to assemble within its boundaries. With 
a population as dense as that of Rhode Island today 
Texas would have one hundred and four million 
people — one-fifth more than are in the United 
States at the present time. With a population as 
dense as is that of New York today Texas would have 
over thirty-nine million people — as that of Pennsyl- 
vania over thirty-six million — as that of Ohio over 
twenty-six million — as that of Illinois over twenty- 
two million. It is perhaps not extravagant to assert 
that within the life of existing generations Texas will 
send rice to China, porcelain to Japan, marble to Italy, 
dressed meats to Chicago, flour to Minneapolis, cloth 
to Massachusetts and presidents to Washington. 

No lovelier land, no grander conformation was ever 
penciled by the sunlight and the rain. From the foot 
of the Balcones the San Antonio river leaps full-born. 
The fountains of Del Rio and San Marcos surpass 
Egeria and Bandusia. The porphyried turrets beyond 
the Pecos, the crest of the Sierra Diablo, resembling 
the acropolis of some forgotten Athens, outrival the 
Etna of Sicily, the Ymesfield of Norway, the Ben Nevis 
of Scotland, the Snowdon of Wales. The impassive 
array of granite highlands, lordly plateaus, the Cam- 
brian cliffs, the sweeping solitudes of the Paloduro 
Canyon, the melody of the Silver Falls, the rugged 

288 



A Tribute to Texas 



mystery of the Wild Rose Pass content the longings 
for sublimity. 

Two hundred miles or more below El Paso the™Rio 
Grande presents "one of the most remarkable features 
on the face of the globe, that of a river traversing at 
an oblique angle a chain of lofty mountains and mak- 
ing through these on a gigantic scale what is called 
in Spanish America a canyon, that is, a river hemmed 
in by vertical walls." 

Midway between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, 
almost equally distant from the equator and the arctic 
circle, Texas is the proper center of immigration, com- 
merce and production, the heart of a continent, the 
throne of a hemisphere. From Rome it has inherited 
through the Spanish domination many features of the 
classic system of law and jurisprudence. From its 
Anglo-American traditions and affiliations it has de- 
rived the patriotism, the justice, the domestic virtues, 
the independence, the self-government of the Teu- 
tonic race. Thus the Latin and the Teuton, after the 
wanderings of centuries, have met within its borders 
to construct the highest civilization yet achieved. Na- 
ture has dowried its titanic youth with every climate, 
every commodity and every soil. Valor consecrates^ 
its annals, grandeur robes its natural environment, 
justice illuminates its institutions. The Panama 
Canal will connect it with all markets and all peo- 
ples, making it the intermediary of the earth. Occu- 
pying a favorable position on the highway of the 
nations, the convergent point for migration and 
for trade, its happy millions typifying the supreme de- 
velopment of education, industry, science, fraternity, 
devotion to country and to God — fact and prophecy 
point alike to one result. When the Gulf of Mexico 
shall repeat in wider radiance the ancient glory of the 

289 

19 



A Tribute to Texas 



Mediterranean and keels and flags from every sea 
adorn its waters, Texas, the new Venetia, will take a 
leading part in the earth's development. 



IF 



290 



CHRISTIAN CITIZENSHIP. 

DELIVERED BEFORE THE STATE EPWORTH 
LEAGUE OF TEXAS. 

PERHAPS the most fundamental, the most sig- 
nificant, the most universal condition of hu- 
man existence is described in the term "citi- 
zenship." It is at once the most ancient and 
most modern mark of civilization. The moment 
mankind coalesced or divided, as the case may 
have been, into societies sufficiently organized 
to have made possible the establishment of defin- 
ite and permanent relations between the societies and 
the individuals composing them, the sum of these re- 
lations constituted a primitive citizenship. It is en- 
tirely conceivable that rude but distinct forms of citi- 
zenship united peoples long before they occupied def- 
inite territories or developed permanent systems of 
government. Whatever ties connected the first hu- 
man groups, whether the necessity for defense or the 
ambition for plunder, whether the desire for a peace- 
ful development or the yearning for a warlike destiny, 
the duties and relations which preserved and perpetu- 
ated such associations comprised the first elements of 
citizenship. The exercise of these duties and relations 
resulted in the creation of determinate institutions. 
The progress of mankind has been reflected in the 
rise and fall of institutions. Governments, armies, 
navies, colleges, altars, temples, parliaments, social, 
commercial and religious organizations, states, colon- 
ies, provinces and empires have expressed the co-opera- 
tive impulse which inaugurated society. Now institu- 
tions must be distinguished from the power which 
creates them. The impulse, the attitude, the relation- 

291 



Christian Citizenship 



ship which produce institutions are the basic compo- 
nents, the inherent factors of citizenship. Citizenship, 
therefore, is not in itself an institution, but the source 
of institutions. It is the relation which lies at the 
very beginning of society and permeates its founda- 
tions in every age. 

But the relation of citizenship applies not alone to 
society as a whole ; it reaches directly or indirectly, ac- 
tually or potentially, every individual in every period. 
The people as a whole have always been the ultimate 
arbiters of history, the final source of power. The func- 
tion of citizenship has remained their basic and univer- 
sal weapon. Often the people have failed or refused 
to exercise this capacity. Often it has remained un- 
used so long as almost to be forgotten. Often the 
people have acquiesced in despotism; often they have 
consented to their own humiliation. But there has 
never been an hour in all history in which the people 
could not immediately have become the rulers of 
society. They had but to rise and strike. The know- 
ledge of this slumbering power has made tyrants trem- 
ble on thrones that seemed eternal. In exact propor- 
tion as this function has been employed for the pro- 
motion of human welfare the world has grown in 
happiness, in prosperity and liberty. 

Much of the unhappiness, the oppression and the 
crime in the history of society has been due to the 
failure to distinguish between citizenship and exist- 
ing institutions, to recognize citizenship as a function 
of the individual and institutions as the result of a 
particular exercise of that function, to grasp the idea 
of citizenship as the creator and all human institutions 
the creation. The application of this distinction to 
human affairs insures perfect freedom. It makes sys- 
tems and institutions, offices, solemnities, ceremonies, 

292 



Christian Citizenship 



precedents dependent solely upon the popular view 
of their righteousness and usefulness. It makes man 
the central figure and all forms and institutions sub- 
ordinate and secondary. It makes the will of the 
people the dominant influence in society. Self-govern- 
ment and equality before the law are its necessary ac- 
companiments. We see at once that the proper ex- 
ercise of this function requires in the individual the 
noblest qualifications. The creation and the control 
of institutions involve the destinies of the race. In 
registering his will at the ballot box the individual 
shares in a sense the prerogatives of divinity. The 
creation of man and earth was the work of God. The 
enactment of laws and the establishment of institu- 
tions which shape and govern the life of man and the 
fate of the nations of the earth are a logical continua- 
tion of that work. 

Human happiness may be measured principally by 
the degree in which the populations of earth have em- 
bodied in their institutions the true character and the 
proper conception of citizenship. We have seen that 
the ideal capacity of citizenship is the control of hu- 
man affairs by the individual as a co-equal member 
of a self-governing society, that citizenship is the 
function through which the masses wield the powers 
of government and mould the institutions of economic 
and political life. We have seen that at any moment 
the people may through a concerted and appropriate 
exercise of this function assume control of their own 
destinies. The innumerable tragedies of history may 
be ascribed to the failure of the individual through 
ignorance, through neglect, through inherent perver- 
sities and ignoble passions to utilize this sacred capac- 
ity for the welfare of himself and the state. The con- 
trol of institutions, the formation of governmental 

293 



Christian Citizenship 



systems to meet the changing needs of changing ages, 
the varying emergencies of human development — these, 
the necessary attributes of an untrammeled citizen- 
ship, involve, I repeat, the extension and continuance 
of the initial labors of God in summoning the earth 
from the elemental shadows. For this reason the hu- 
man intelligence alone is incapable both of the due ap- 
preciation and the permanent exercise of the preroga- 
tives of government. For this reason no society of 
the crudest form has ever existed in which the idea 
of God was not operative in some fundamental way. 
Citizenship is essentially a creative function. Crea- 
tiveness is a quality of God, not man. Consequently 
there can be no society and no citizenship disassociated 
from the idea of God. 

To the idea of a God, to the doctrine of immortality 
and to the beliefs and principles emanating from both, 
all governments have looked and must continue to look 
for the basis of loyal citizenship and obedience to law. 
The observation of Plutarch is as true today as it was 
when first uttered over 1,900 years ago — "You may 
travel all the world and you may find cities without 
walls, without king, without mint, without theater, 
without gymnasium, but you will nowhere find a city 
without a God, without prayer, without oracle, without 
sacrifice. Sooner may a city stand without foundations 
than a state without belief in God. This is the bond of 
all society, the pillar of all education." 

Let us observe here that while the idea of a God 
and the practice of religion were necessary factors in 
the organization and progress of every people and 
every nation from the beginning of history, by no 
means does it follow that these ancient beliefs rested 
on a true conception of deity. In fact the early relig- 
ions of the world were almost wholly materialistic and 

294 



Christian Citizenship 



represented but dimly and imperfectly the impulse 
which was the universal basis of society and citizen- 
ship. They were pantheisms which deified the forces 
of nature, the traits and functions of men, yea, the 
attributes of the state itself. They had a basis es- 
sentially physical, essentially human, and reflected in 
idolatrous rites, festivities and numberless deities 
the history and characteristics of the various races 
and nations. Desires and lusts and vices were typi- 
fied by a vitiated pagan fancy in particular deities. 
These pagan creeds were fundamentally united with 
the life of the state and invested the state, its ruling 
classes and its institutions with a solemnity that made 
it impossible for the people to understand or to exercise 
the proper functions of citizenship. When the world had 
been consolidated under the Roman empire each nation 
sent to Rome its conquered gods to be ranged in the 
pantheon with the deities of the omnipotent republic, 
and humanity, saddened and disenchanted by the mot- 
ley array, sank into the abysses of moral decay, spir- 
itual death and political serfdom. On account of the 
apparent eternity and invincibility of Rome its state 
religion was reverently observed by every Roman and 
imposed on all mankind. The emperor as the embodi- 
ment of Roman authority and power was exalted to the 
station of a god and became an object of universal wor- 
ship. The spectacle of a monster gorged with blood and 
lust and gluttony — a Tiberius, a Caligula, a Claudius or 
a Nero, parading as a god aroused a skeptical disgust 
that added to the darkness of the time. The old, na- 
tional creeds had lost their pristine vitality. The human 
element in religion and government, based in the begin- 
ning on foundations of faith and liberty, however pure, 
had degenerated, as it always will, into mere man- 
worship, grossest materialism and universal tyranny. 

295 



Christian Citizenship 



It is necessary to an accurate discussion of the 
subject now to advert to the one nation which in the 
earliest stages of social development became the mes- 
senger of the true and living God. Of all the nations 
of the primal eras and of the eras intervening before 
the rise of Christianity the Hebrew commonwealth 
alone nurtured the proper conception of divinity. In 
fact, the Hebrew commonwealth exemplified for cen- 
turies every element and every ornament of what I 
shall later describe as Christian citizenship except 
the principle of universal love which found peculiar 
and unequaled illustration in the life of Christ. The 
lack of this crowning element was recognized in Judaic 
literature and teaching and Hebraic prophecy pointed 
to Christ as the fulfillment of the law. Yet such was 
the worship of the law into which the doctrines of the 
spirit had crystalized that the entire political and 
social life of Israel succumbed to the sway of an un- 
bending formalism. The citizen was entirely subject 
to the institutions and ceremonies of the law; to have 
suggested their abolition or alteration would have 
been regarded as blasphemy. Thus religion and gov- 
ernment in the only nation that had known the wor- 
ship of the true and eternal God became so inseparably 
associated that the function of citizenship as a creative, 
political authority became impossible not only of ex- 
ercise, but almost of conception. Thus the initial com- 
monwealth of history, the chosen medium of the real 
and omnipotent God, fell finally into a despotism as 
hopeless and as cruel as that of any pagan country. 
The human desire for power and display had polluted 
the spiritual currents that Abraham had smitten from 
the very throne of God — yea, had diverted them into 
the wastes of vapid ceremony. Such was the condi- 

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tion of Israel when with the other nations of the world 
it fell beneath the sway of Rome. 

It is impossible not to see a divine purpose in the 
fact that Christianity and the Roman empire began at 
the same time. In the Roman supremacy human 
power reached a height it will probably never again 
attain. For the first time the world was under a per- 
manent and universal political dominion. It was an 
age of material splendor on a world-encompassing, a 
world-astounding scale. It was the apotheosis of the 
flesh. Citizenship was an empty caricature, liberty a 
myth, religion a chaos. The restraint of early beliefs 
had disappeared. The worship of the emperor as the 
representative of Roman might was the only universal 
creed. Without faith, without hope, without consola- 
tion, without tenderness men confronted the problems 
of existence with rankest superstition, with absolute 
atheism, or with the rites and teachings of myriads of 
grotesque and brutal cults. The populace found its 
chief delight in actual murder on the stage or in the 
mangling of men and beasts in the arena. The luxury 
of the few and the poverty of the many presented an 
appalling antithesis. 

"On that hard pagan world disgust 

And secret loathing fell; 
Deep weariness and sated lust 

Made human life a hell. 
In his cool hall, with haggard eyes, 

The Roman noble lay; 
He drove abroad in furious guise 

Along the Appian Way; 
He made a feast, drank fierce and fast, 

And crowned his hair with flowers — 
No easier nor no quicker past 

The impracticable hours." 

In such a period Christ lived and taught and died. 
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In such a period Christ illustrated the supreme concep- 
tion of brotherhood and love. What a contrast between 
Christ and Augustus, between Paul and Tiberius, be- 
tween Peter and Caligula, between James and Nero, 
between John and Domitian ! It requires but little ef- 
fort to observe that God utilized the most dramatic 
period of human history for this contrast in order that 
the world might have an eternal picture, an everlasting 
type of the endless conflict between the world and 
the church, between the flesh and the spirit, between 
anti-Christ and Christ. Now, what was the chief sig- 
nificance of the life of Christ and what was its relation 
to the function of citizenship which as a directing 
power in human affairs had become with liberty and 
with faith absolutely moribund? In order to under- 
stand the meaning of that wonderful existence it is 
necessary briefly to review it. 

We see the people and the priests assemble for 
the morning sacrifice in Jerusalem. We see Zacharias 
before the altar among the splendors of the temple. 
We see his paling cheek, his speechless lips, as an 
angel flashes before him to announce that there shall be 
born to Elizabeth the forerunner of the son of God. We 
see that angel reappear in Nazareth on a hill in Galilee 
and an humble home grow radiant with the sacred 
presence as Mary, the betrothed of Joseph, hears the 
message of a motherhood that shall transform human- 
ity. How significant this beginning! What a com- 
mentary on privilege and rank and power; what a 
demonstration of the inherent dignity of man, one of 
the primary elements of true citizenship ! The ambas- 
sador of God forsakes the palatial city to find among 
the plain and unassuming people of a country village 
the mother of the monarch of eternity. If the heavenly 
messenger pauses among the mighty it is but to chcose 

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the herald of the prince of peace. We observe the 
virgin mother seek Elizabeth and we hear the saluta- 
tion with which the mother of the unborn harbinger 
greets the mother of the unborn Lord. We hear the 
responding hymn of Mary, her first homage to the 
child divine. We see Joseph rise from the dream in 
which the marvelous story was to him unfolded and 
welcome Mary to his heart and home. We hear the 
paeans of thanksgiving on the reanimate tongue of 
Zacharias as he salutes the birth of John. We see the 
heights of Bethlehem; the streets are thronged — the 
Roman enrollment is in progress. Joseph and Mary, 
compelled by law to report at this ancient seat of their 
common ancestor, David, arrive to find no place to 
lodge. Clad in coarse and simple garb, weary with 
the journey of three winter days from Galilee along 
the Jordan and by the fords of Jericho the humble 
workman and his wife wander unnoticed among the 
crowds and rejoice to discover a stable wherefn rest 
and quiet may be found. Does it not occur to us that 
Mary in this humble abode is an infinitely grander fig- 
ure than Zenobia in the palaces of Palmyra and that 
this incident glorifies for all time the humblest homes, 
the poorest habitations of men? Do we not gain an 
additional insight into the significance of Christian 
citizenship as the mother of the Redeemer sinks grate- 
fully on a bed of straw and the most memorable 
night in the history of the world begins? The heavens 
glisten and sleep, not Rome, is master of the earth. 

The castle of Herod looms above the foliage of the 
almond groves. Eastward rolls the sea of judgment; 
westward gleams the road to Hebron. Little does 
Augustus in the far, imperial city dream that in a 
Judean manger is about to appear a ruler whose empire 
will live when all the governments of earth nave per- 

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ished. Suddenly the skies above the outlying fields 
send down an Amazon of light and before the as- 
tounded shepherds stands a seraph who proclaims the 
advent of the Son of God. The empyrean is ablaze and 
from ethereal hosts burst harmonies that men on earth 
may never hear again. These melodies kings did not 
hear; they were poured upon the lowly laborers of 
the plains who followed the guiding ray until it rested 
at Immanuers feet. What a tribute to the doctrine of 
equality, another element of Christian citizenship ! The 
Savior of the world was born among the masses of the 
people in a lowly abode. He was not born among the 
powerful and the proud. His birth was announced by 
angels to the plain laborers of the Judean fields; it 
was not trumpeted from the palaces of Jerusalem and 
Rome. 

We see the holy family in the temple at Jerusalem 
bringing the offering of the poor for the ceremonies 
of purification and redemption. We see Mary by the 
great Nicanor Gate waiting with the child for the 
benediction of the sanctuary. We see the clouds of 
incense, we hear the songs of Simeon and Anna as 
they alone perceive the true character of the mighty 
babe. We see the sages of the east directed by a 
strange conjunction of the planets enter the court of 
Herod to inquire where the Messiah may be found. 
With consternation on his brow and murder in his 
soul the bloody Herod begins a search for the infant 
Savior. The sages, having visited the lowly home at 
Bethlehem and having worshipped at the cradle of the 
King of Life, laying before Him gifts of gold in expres- 
sion of His royalty, of myrrh in expression of His hu- 
manity and of incense in expression of His divinity, re- 
turn into their own country by another way. We see the 
slaughter of the innocents, the flight of Joseph, Mary 

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and the Child to Egypt. We see the life of Herod 
close in shadow, the slow agony of disease, the mem- 
ory of countless crimes, the dread of the living and 
the recollection of the dead, converting his palace into 
a chamber of horror. We see the return to Nazareth, 
the early years in which the wondrous Child increased 
in wisdom, in stature, and in favor with God and man. 
We see Him in the temple at the age of twelve debat- 
ing the deepest problems with the foremost expounders 
of the law. We see Him adopt the calling of Joseph 
and as a carpenter in that Galilean village devote 
His life to humble toil. For eighteen years He 
follows that obscure avocation contented with the bar- 
est necessities, the simplest, purest habits, a stranger 
to luxury, power and renown. What an illustration 
of one of the elementary factors of Christian citizen- 
ship, the glory of toil! The Son of God chose the lot 
of the poor. In obscurity and poverty, in the sweat of 
hands and brow, He made the preparation for those 
final years whose teachings and achievements go 
thundering athwart the front of time. 

We hear the voice of John proclaiming the new 
kingdom and urging repentance on the world, of John 
who had forsaken the splendid home of his birth, and 
after a long period of self-banishment and denial 
emerged from the solitudes of nature to denounce the 
sins of earth and herald the approaching Christ, of 

"John than which man a sadder or a greater 
Not till this day has been of woman born; 
John like some iron peak by the Creator 
Fired with the red glow of the rushing morn." 

We see the baptism in the Jordan, the descent of the 
dove, the spiritual coronation. We hear God's recogni- 
tion of the beloved son. We hear the tempters' pleas, 

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the triumphant answers. We see Him gathering His 
disciples from the lowly. We behold the marriage 
feast at Cana. We see the water blush to wine and we 
observe that He selects this humble peasant wedding 
as the scene of His initial miracle. We see the begin- 
ning of His earthly ministry at Capernaum. We see 
Him revisit the temple at Jerusalem to scourge the 
money-changers from its colonnades. We see Nico- 
demus leave his lofty station to learn from the Gali- 
lean the lesson of regeneration. We see John a wasted 
prisoner in a gloomy fortress on the Dead Sea's bar- 
ren shore. We see the departure of Christ for Galilee ; 
we hear the memorable announcement to the woman 
of Samaria. We see Him in the synagogue at Naz- 
areth, His text Isaiah's prophecy. We hear His proc- 
lamation that He is Himself the Messiah whom Isaiah 
had foretold. We hear the angry tumult of the doubt- 
ing congregation who refuse to believe that this hum- 
ble carpenter they have known so long is the Deliverer 
for whom they have hoped through centuries. We 
see Him dragged with murderous intention to the 
mountain's brow; we see Him pass in majesty and 
mystery out of the disordered ranks unharmed. We 
see Him call back to life and earth the courtier's dying 
son. We see Him drive the terror from the madman's 
soul, the fever from the house of Simon. We see the 
stricken myriads gather to receive His healing touch 
at sunset until 

"A lazar-house it seemed; wherein were laid 
Numbers of all diseased; all maladies 
Of ghastly spasm and racking torture, qualms 
Of heart-sick agony, all fev'rous kinds, 
Demoniac frenzy, moping melancholy, 
And moonstruck madness." 

We hear Him preaching at the water's side; we see 

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Him fill the empty nets. We see the apostolic bands 
completed; we hear the sermon on the mount, the 
beatitudes that compose the basis and the fountain of 
a flawless citizenship. We see the leper cleansed, the 
servant of the centurion restored. We see the widow's 
child rise at His bidding from the dead; we hear the 
message from the prison-tortured John. We see the 
tears of Mary Magdalene falling like silver rain upon 
His feet at the banquet of the Pharisee; we hear the 
tender words : "Thy faith hath saved thee ; go in peace." 
We see Him as He walks in Galilee instructing the 
multitude with parable, with precept and with miracle, 
whispering silence to the storm and revivifying death. 
We see Him reclaim the Bethesdan paralytic; we hear 
the envious questionings, the wrathful mutterings from 
lofty places which he knows to be the foretokening 
of persecution and destruction. We hear the revelry 
in the palace of Antipas, the drunken promise, Salome's 
demand. We see the severed head of John, its livid 
features frowning on a scene of shame. We see the 
Master feeding the five thousand and walking on the 
warring waves. We see the journey into Tyre and 
Sidon after the news of John's dark fate, the deeds of 
sympathy among the heathen. We hear His fore- 
shadowings of His death and resurrection on the road 
to Philippi. We see the glory of the transfiguration. 
We hear Him speaking as man never spake at the 
feast of the tabernacles. We see the restoration of 
the beggar's sight, the ordainment of the seventy, the 
sad farewell to Galilee. We see the journey into Perea, 
the works of wonder and of love accompanied by 
teachings of eternal import. We see Lazarus ascend- 
ing from the tomb, the meeting at the house of Caia- 
phas whence issues the decree of death, the removal 
to Ephraim. We see Bartimaeus lift his dazzled eyes 

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from darkness into day; we hear Zaccheus renounce 
the fruits of sin. We see the anointment from the 
vase of alabaster, the dark bargaining of the traitorous 
apostle. We hear the lamentations on the Mount of 
Olives; we see the day of triumph in the temple. We 
hear the luminous declarations with which he confutes 
the shrewdest sophistry of man. We hear the lawyer 
asking: "Master, which is the great commandment in 
the law?" Then comes the marvelous reply: "Thou 
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and 
with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the 
first and great commandment. And the second is like 
unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On 
these two commandments hang all the law and the 
prophets." Thus Christ announces the doctrine of the 
fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man, making 
love of God and man the pre-eminent duty of the hu- 
man race. Thus Christ sounds the dominant note of 
Christian citizenship. 

We hear the denunciation of earth's perversity 
and guilt, the prophecy of woe. We hear Him praise 
the widow's mite. We see Him lift the horizons of 
time and interpret future history. We see the pay- 
ment of the price of treachery. We see the last supper ; 
we hear the final discourse in which is given the new 
commandment, "Love one another," a supreme expres- 
sion of Christian citizenship. 

We see the agony of Gethsemane, the betray- 
ing kiss, the flight of every follower, the unre- 
sisted seizure. We see the midnight trials in the 
courts of Annas and of Caiaphas, we hear the blows and 
curses of the guards. We hear the repudiation by the 
bravest of the disciples, the judgment of the San- 
hedrim, the taunts and insults of the crowd. We see 
the acquittals in the palaces of Pilate and of Herod, 

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the craven surrender of the godly martyr by the former 
to the mob. We hear the sickening rhythm of the lash ; 
we see the crown of pain, the derisive worship of the 
degraded soldiery. We hear the fatal sentence, the 
formula of death. We see the shameful procession 
from the Praetorium to Golgotha; we hear the wail- 
ings of the daughters of Jerusalem. We see the torture 
of the cross; we hear the quivering accents of for- 
giving love and interceding prayer, the last sigh of 
departing life amid the gloom and shock of universal 
storm. We see the women at the sepulcher, the re- 
appearances on earth, the passing of the forty days, 
the ascension into the clouds. 

From that time forward charity and love became 
the guiding principles of humanity. From that time 
forward the inner virtues began to tower over rank 
and pomp, mercy over might, and pity over pride. From 
that time forward the human heart began to soften 
into an infinite tenderness under the example of the 
infinite compassion of omnipotence. From that time 
forward the world's ideals began to change. To wield 
the scepter; to hold dominion over millions; to con- 
quer cities; to lead triumphant armies over myriads 
of bleeding dead; to accumulate riches; to wallow in 
boastful luxury had been the culminating marks of 
greatness. But after the ministrations of Christ among 
the lowliest of earth the crowning ambitions and oc- 
cupations of mankind began to find expression in the 
relief of pain, the succor of the unfortunate, the pro- 
tection of the weak, the defense of human rights, the 
preservation of freedom, the establishment of equality 
and brotherhood. The world had but a dim conception 
of equality before the death of Christ for every man 
regardless of earthly station and condition gave every 
life a dignity distinct, a new and higher meaning. His 

305 

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life was an immortal song of brotherhood, a harmony 
divine, whose strains, beginning feebly in the caves 
and rocks where early Christians fled for worship, 
trembling on the lips of martyrs as their bodies flamed 
above the revelry of the Caesars, rising from the 
shores and seas and beating against the palace and the 
court until the pagan heart was changed, whispering 
its melodies in the barbarian's forest home, animating 
the crusades and awakening in the modern world 
the spirit of liberty, stirred the soul of France with 
the metric thunder of the Marseillaise and aroused 
American patriotism with the hymn — 

"My country 'tis of thee 

Sweet land of liberty, 

Of thee I sing." 

We have seen that citizenship is the true source 
of human institutions, that it makes the individual 
citizen a co-equal ruler of society and confers upon 
him a supreme and an inherent dignity. We have seen 
that before the advent of Christianity the world com- 
pletely failed to appreciate the importance of the in- 
dividual life as the basis of an ideal citizenship. We 
have seen that the elementary religions of the world, 
even the worship of the living God, became the but- 
tresses of tyranny. Such were the perversities, such 
the imperfections of the human nature, the human love 
of power, ostentation, conquest and all the glittering 
paraphernalia of display and sin that the idea of the 
fundamental and equal value of every human life on 
which rests unrestricted citizenship and universal free- 
dom was entirely beyond the comprehension of man. 
It required the unspeakable love, the tender ministra- 
tion, the broken body and the dripping blood of Jesus 
Christ to redeem society and to establish a proper con- 

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ception of citizenship. When the world saw the lowly 
Galilean parentage, the birth in the cave, the life in 
the shop, the gathering of the disciples from the poor, 
the healing and uplifting of every condition and every 
class, the forgiveness of sin through penitence and 
faith, the announcement of love and brotherhood as 
the crown of law, the torn hands, the lacerated side, 
the death-dew on the shuddering lip and brow, the 
writhing hours of insulted agony, the supreme sacri- 
fice for every individual soul, it began to understand 
the importance and the dignity of every individual 
life. The love of Christ for all mankind as exempli- 
fied in His deeds and death gave every human life the 
consequence and the distinction it must possess to 
make possible a perfect citizenship. Thus Christian 
citizenship is the ideal citizenship. Paul summarizes 
the teachings of Christ, the meaning of His life and 
the essence of Christian citizenship in Galatians 5-13: 
"For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty, only 
use not liberty as an occasion to the flesh, but by love 
serve ye one another." 

Christ permitted no political significance to be 
connected with His teachings. This does not mean, 
however, that His doctrines were without political 
influence. Indeed Christ's exhortation and example 
transformed the political, the social, the intellectual 
and religious world. He wrought the most profound 
and universal revolution human affairs have ever 
known. He is the fundamental figure of all history. 
He transformed the human heart and empires yielded, 
despotisms fell. Today the freest and most progressive 
nations are those whose peoples follow Him. Our own 
country owes its greatness to the ideas of individual 
equality, of liberty under law, of brotherhood and 
love His life elucidated. As long as American citi- 

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zens keep within their hearts the image and the mem- 
ory of His racked and mangled body the American 
nation will grow in "prosperity, in happiness, in 
righteous power. 

Not only has Christian citizenship brought happi- 
ness and freedom to individuals and nations, but the 
Christian influence is developing a world-citizenship 
and hastening the advent of universal peace. We owe 
to the Christian impulse the law of nations and the 
gradual advance toward international arbitration. Be- 
fore the Christian era these ideas were unknown. There 
were instances of arbitration between certain cities 
and communities in early Greece, but they were con- 
fined to the Hellenic people. In 1603 Sully proposed 
his celebrated "Grand Design," dividing Europe into 
fifteen states and establishing a General Council to 
which all differences were to be submitted. A century 
later the Abbe St. Pierre projected a General League 
of Christendom. In 1789 Jeremy Bentham advocated 
a general congress of nations and Immanuel Kant in 
1795 suggested a federation of free states. Within the 
last century over thirty international congresses have 
assembled to consider questions of mutual concern. 
Among the most important of these may be noted the 
Geneva Congress of 1864 which founded the Inter- 
national Red Cross Society; the Congress of Brussels 
of 1874 which revised and modified the laws of war; 
the various meetings of the Universal Postal Congress 
attended by delegates from almost every nation on the 
globe; the Hague Peace Conference of 1899 which pro- 
vided for the creation of the first permanent court of 
arbitration in history. The Interparliamentary Union, 
a body composed of delegates from practically every 
national legislature in the world, is holding annual 
convocations and contributing materially to the 

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cause of arbitration and peace. It has remained 
for two of the lesser nations of the earth to give 
mankind the most beautiful example of all time. In 
1900 the adjoining republics of Chile and Argentina 
were on the brink of war. In the endeavor to calm the 
passions of the hour and to arrest the crimson tide 
Bishop Benavente of Argentina in a memorable ap- 
peal on Easter Sunday pointed the angry peoples to 
the example of the Galilean and urged the erection of 
a statue of Christ on the frontier uniting the two coun- 
tries. The appeal was not in vain. It was agreed to 
submit the dispute to arbitration and Edward of Eng- 
land was requested to officiate as arbiter. Both coun- 
tries accepted his decision without complaint. The 
effect of this peaceful solution of a question which 
would ordinarily have plunged the disputing nations 
into bloody conflict was magical. Both republics be- 
gan to disarm, Chile converting her arsenals into 
schools, devoting the millions commonly expended for 
battleships to the construction of roads and bridges 
and other monuments of peaceful progress. In cele- 
bration of the happy event both countries joined in 
the erection of a colossal statue of Christ on the loftiest 
summit of the mutual boundary line that traverses 
the crest of the Andes. The statue was made of bronze 
and melted cannon. Inspiring thought! The engines 
of destruction were dismantled and moulded into the 
features of the King of Peace. With one hand support- 
ing the cross, the other pointing Chile, Argentina and 
the world to the everlasting heavens as if pleading for 
the time when war and hate shall cease forever, stands 
the Christ of the Andes on the mountains that divide 
the lands where now the melodies of peace supplant 
the martial cry. On the pedestal the inscription reads : 
"Sooner shall these mountains crumble to dust than 



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Argentines and Chileans break the peace which at the 
feet of Christ the Redeemer they have sworn to main- 
tain." God hasten the breaking of the day when on the 
boundary of every nation of the globe a similar figure 
shall lift its warning finger to teach eternal love, un- 
changing brotherhood and everlasting peace! 

"What gleams so bright on the mountain-top 

In the rising and setting sun? 
What happy song do the rivers shout, 

As down the mountains they run? 

They are singing, 'The beautiful feet have come 

Of Him who publisheth peace; 
Who saith to the lands, the good God reigns, 

And the hell of war shall cease!' 

The angels' song in the skies of old 

At last is echoed of men; 
The beautiful feet have come, have come — 

Christ, go not back again! 

Nor linger there on the mountain-tops; 

Come down to the plain, the shore, 
To the noisy marts, to the plotting kings — 

Wander the wide earth o'er! 

Press into the heart of the warring folk, 

The nations from hate release! 
Press into our hearts, O, feet of Christ, 

And bring the world to thy Peace!" 



IF 



310 



EULOGY OF WASHINGTON. 

DELIVERED IN NATIONAL HOUSE OF REPRE- 
SENTATIVES, FEBRUARY 22, 1911. 

MR. CHAIRMAN— A year ago today the gentle- 
man from Minnesota (Mr. Nye) delivered an 
eloquent eulogy on the life and deeds of 
Washington. On this, another anniversary of Wash- 
ington's birth, I rise for a similar purpose. I trust it 
will become a custom for some member of the House 
to deliver on each succeeding anniversary a tribute to 
his memory. 

How soon are men and all the memories of men 
engulfed beneath the flood of years, their voices stifled 
in the torrent of time. To few indeed of all the multi- 
tudes that have lived and loved and hoped and vanished 
has it been given to surmount the tide. But there is 
one among the company of the great so enduring that 
his character retains its identity unobscured, its radi- 
ance undimmed, and points posterity to ideals of 
thought and conduct that will never be excelled. 
That character is Washington's. In strength of moral 
fiber, in firmness of purpose, in modesty and dignity 
of bearing, in freedom from personal ambition, in cour- 
age that disaster could but emphasize, in judgment, in 
beneficence of example, and in the influence of his 
achievements on the progress of humanity he stands 
unsurpassed. He belongs to the illustrious group that 
has aided to construct governments and societies. 
Without organized society there can be no art, no 
science, no education, no law, no culture, no upward 
stride. The founders and preservers of states are the 
primary instruments of civilization. Among these 
Washington is pre-eminent. 

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Eulogy of Washington 



Let us summon the prodigies of the past, array 
them by his side, and observe how he outranks them 
all. Consider Pericles, one of the most imposing 
figures of antiquity. His name denotes the brightest 
period of Athenian development. His elegance in 
speech and action, his gallantry in arms and gentle- 
ness in peace, his love of the beautiful in art, the just 
in law, his devotion to the masses, their comforts and 
their rights, the splendor of his domestic and foreign 
policies made him the idol of his people. His rule 
and inspiration gave to Athens the Parthenon, the 
Odeon, the Propylea. But on his fame there falls 
the shadow of Aspasia. His sway was personal and 
autocratic; he could not efface his own ambition for 
the general good. His chief concern was the glory 
of the present and of Pericles. Wedded to glamor and 
display, he made himself the exclusive prop and 
guardian of the state, and when he died it fell a prey 
to demagogues and factions. Call Alexander from 
his sarcophagus of gold — the master of the world at 33. 
Statesman, student, warrior, murderer, voluptuary, it 
is difficult to believe that so noble an aspect, such 
towering gifts, could co-exist with such depravity. He 
signalized his access to the throne with the butchery 
of a little girl, the representative of a collateral line, 
while yet within her mother's arms. Shortly before 
he died he crucified the physician who attended the 
last hours of his friend, Hephaestion, and as a sacrifice 
to Hephaestion's memory exterminated a whole com- 
munity. Other friends he sent to death on frivolous 
grounds, destroying in a drunken frenzy a beloved 
companion for questioning his divinity. Extrava- 
gance, dissipation, luxury followed in his crimson 
steps. 

On the other hand, he founded universities and 

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Eulogy of Washington 



cities, and in the pathway of his armies Greek learning 
spread throughout the earth. He became one of the 
determining forces of human history. In ecstatic arro- 
gance he claimed the honors of omnipotence and was 
saluted by a fawning world as son of Jupiter. He 
reached the summits of human power, but his example 
is condemned by the enlightened verdict of posterity. 
The colossal fabric his sword had builded did not long 
survive; he contributed little to freedom and less to 
virtue. Consider Hannibal, the consummate strat- 
egist, who at 26 began the boldest enterprise in military 
annals and who for sixteen years disputed with Rome 
the scepter of the world. Mountains, glaciers, gorges, 
legions, storms, and winters could not arrest his ad- 
vance from Carthage to the interior of Italy. Main- 
taining for sixteen years in hostile territory an army 
of twenty different nationalities, defeating the troops 
and generals of a race transcendent in military prowess, 
he was the only barrier between the Roman republic 
and the ascendancy of the earth. He was pronounced 
by Polybius the model warrior of all time, but he 
fought for empire, not for principle. Recalled by the 
government his valor had made immortal he was at- 
tacked and banished. But his spirit was unbroken, his 
bitterness against his ancient antagonists undiminished. 
Forming confederacies in Asia, he struggled on to 
find at last the only refuge from his foes in suicide. 
Inglorious end! He added nothing to the cause of 
human liberty; with him it was Carthage against 
Rome for world supremacy. Hatred of his enemies 
was the dominating passion of his existence; death 
by his own hand in a land of strangers was his fate. 

Call mighty Julius, commander, historian, politi- 
cian, who gathered into his own possession the sub- 
stance of authority while the people worshipped the 

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Eulogy of Washington 



symbols of a dead republic. Accamplished in diplo- 
macy and war, unprincipled in conduct, skilled in 
every art of winning popular devotion, he believed in 
neither God nor freedom. He filled the world's hori- 
zon until assassination laid his corpse upon the corpse 
he had made of liberty. The effect of his career was 
to magnify the avocation of arms, to belittle peace, to 
place military authority and military ideals above the 
civil in the estimation of his time. He could think 
of no term more shameful in rebuking a body of mu- 
tinous soldiers than to address them as citizens. He 
builded a personal tyranny on the ruins of human 
rights; his name became an emblem of autocracy. 
On the foundation of his sword arose the structure of 
the world's first universal empire. A thousand years 
of kings and emperors compose the heritage he left 
the world. Consider Charlemagne, whose marvelous 
capacity lifted him to the overlordship of nearly all of 
medieval Europe. He did much to re-establish order 
and culture in a time of violence. He founded schools, 
encouraged literature, and in a series of proclamations 
called capitularies announced standards of thought 
and action that were termed by Ampere the charter of 
modern knowledge. But while he advanced the learn- 
ing he made no effort to restore the liberties of men. 
His hands were wet with blood of helpless victims, 
and imperial power had no stronger votary. Desola- 
tion, waste and massacre are too prominent among the 
memorials of his dominion. Call William, preserver of 
Normandy, conqueror of England, victor of Val-es- 
Dunes, of Varaville, and Senlac — William, superb alike 
in battle and council chamber ; terrible in countenance 
and in strife, gigantic in stature and in brain, of whom 
Freeman declared : "No man that ever trod this earth 



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was endowed with greater natural gifts; to no man 
was it ever granted to accomplish greater things." 

The fact remains, however, that he accomplished 
little for the liberty and the happiness of man. The 
lawlessness and cruelty of his Viking antecedents 
found expression in the ferocity of his revenge and 
wrath. Throughout all England his invading fires 
lit up a scene of famine, pestilence and death. Often 
he practiced the most revolting barbarities, on one 
occasion burning out the eyes of prisoners, hewing 
hands and feet from living bodies. 

Observe Napoleon, without whose name no history 
of the world may be called complete; Napoleon who 
rewrote the map of Europe with his sword ; Napoleon 
whose personality and power aroused a devotion among 
his countrymen that approached idolatry; Napoleon 
whose brain, said Hugo, "was the sum of human facul- 
ties, and who was seen standing erect on the horizon, 
a gleaming scimitar in his hand, a splendor in his eyes, 
unfolding amid the thunder his two wings, the Grand 
Army and the Old Guard." He assumed control of 
France when through its veins were leaping the new- 
born fires of revolution, the virgin energies of fraternity 
and freedom. Dazzling his countrymen with his genius 
he turned these sacred currents to the elevation of him- 
self. Thus he re-established tyranny with the very 
forces that had overthrown it. Thus he exalted his 
own fortunes above the fortunes of his country, his 
own interests above the interests of humanity. Beetho- 
ven, monarch of all harmony, the friend of man, who 
registered in melody the mutations of history, com- 
posed a triumphal symphony in honor of Napoleon 
when his elevation to the first consulship seemed an 
appropriate sequel to the revolution. Hearing that 
Napoleon had yielded to the lust of power and made 

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himself an emperor, he changed the symphony into a 
funeral march to symbolize the death of liberty. 

The contrast presented by the life of Washington 
with these other lives is gratifying and refreshing not 
only to every American, but to the friends of liberty 
in every portion of the globe. Without experience in 
directing warlike operations on an extended scale, 
without adequate equipment for his troops, with- 
out a supporting government or treasury of even mod- 
erate strength, he was summoned from the farm to 
the red arena of the battle. Through incredible diffi- 
culties, with patience and courage that bordered on 
the superhuman, he led a small and undisciplined body 
of men taken suddenly from the ordinary callings of 
life, to final victory against one of the foremost nations 
of the world. In triumph and in disaster he was alike 
immovable and serene; in official conduct and in pri- 
vate intercourse his every act was free from intemper- 
ance, immorality or corruption. No massacre of help- 
less foes, no deeds of cruelty defiled his fame. He 
claimed and received no reward for his services beyond 
the gratitude of his country. The idol of the army and 
the people, he might easily have become a king, yea, 
established an empire that would ultimately have em- 
braced a continent. He rejected the glittering prospect 
to resume the cultivation of the soil in the seclusion of 
Mount Vernon, his rural home. A few years later he 
was again summoned to his country's aid. As the 
presiding officer of the convention that framed the 
American constitution, as the first president of the 
republic it created, a republic that in eleven decades 
has reached a population of approximately a hundred 
millions, and whose example illuminates the world, he 
became for all time one of the chief figures in the 
advancement of human happiness and freedom. Again 

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he retired to his ancestral halls and fields where he 
remained until his death. Thus he taught that the 
pursuits of peace are more sublime than those of war, 
the functions of private life more noble than those of 
public station, the attractions of the farm more perma- 
nent and uplifting than those of noisy cities. 

And who will deny that the hand that wielded the 
sword of righteous revolution, that forced the tyrant 
from our shores, that signed the American constitu- 
tion and guided the mightiest republic of all history 
into secure and glorious being was ever greater than 
when it trained the roses in the gardens of Mount 
Vernon? There is a significance in the fact that 
Washington perished practically at the close of the 
eighteenth century. That century marked the perma- 
nent advent of liberty in human institutions; it wit- 
nessed the birth and rise of Washington, without whom 
this advent might have been delayed indefinitely. Thus 
an ideal century and an ideal man died almost together. 
As sculpture finds its most beautiful expression in the 
marbles of Phidias, painting its loftiest era in the 
frescoes of Raphael, dramatic poetry its superbest 
notes in the plays of Shakespeare, philosophy its pro- 
foundest embodiment in the inductions of Aristotle, 
music its most perfect utterance in the oratorios of 
Handel, the operas of Mozart, the sonatas of Beetho- 
ven, so human conduct finds its brightest mirror in 
the life and deeds of Washington. 

Of such world import is his name that it looms 
larger through the gathering years. Today, more than 
a century after his death, the interest and the love of 
earth's increasing millions are centered in his memory. 
Let me refer here to the modest ceremony of his burial, 
an episode that has not received the attention it de- 
serves. His funeral was in keeping with the quiet 

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and simple majesty that had marked his whole exist- 
ence. Under the stately portico of his home on one 
of the loveliest eminences of the Potomac rested his 
form on a December afternoon nearly 112 years ago. 

The peace of God was on his brow; the affection 
of a liberated people at his feet. The impression of 
serenity and repose his motionless frame imparted 
gave evidence that in death he had but added another 
victory to the long list of his achievements. No pomp, 
no decoration, no pride and circumstance of state em- 
blazoned these final hours. From the countryside and 
from neighboring Alexandria poured his friends and 
fellow citizens in informal array. A few companies 
of artillery and cavalry with a single band of music 
gave the only martial touch to the proceedings. The 
firing of minute guns from a little vessel in the Poto- 
mac; the procession across the lawns and slopes to 
the family vault upon the river's edge ; the dirge that 
quavered in the December winds and sobbed upon 
the waters ; the chanting of the Episcopal orders of the 
dead ; the death service of the Masonic ritual with the 
response, "So mote it be," from the brotherhood he 
loved and honored; the commanding figures of the 
pallbearers, all colonels of the revolution, his comrades 
in war, his friends in peace ; the luster of the sun with 
which his soul went down that evening to rise again 
upon the shores of endless morning, comprise a picture 
that will never vanish from the lengthening galleries 
of immortality. 

And so they laid him down to sleep in the loving 
arms of old Mount Vernon where the poplar and the 
aspen whisper peace to his ashes and glory to his soul ; 
where the Potomac brings every day the message of a 
people's love and veneration. 



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